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Scottish Industrial Networking Initiative in Mathematical Sciences

Case Studies
Example: communications technology sector - a small 2-person start-up company in central Scotland contacted the SINIMS project office early in Phase 1. The company is developing a new technology to allow higher bandwidth communication and data transfer over the internet (patent pending). The company is developing a prototype of the technology to demonstrate to potential partners. The company sought assistance in the validation of the signal processing algorithms. Through SINIMS, a mathematician working at the University of Edinburgh was identified as having relevant expertise. Assistance was provided by 5 days of consultancy, at the end of which a short report was delivered summarising the results of the analysis. The analysis is useful not only to the company that commissioned the consultancy, but also to potential investors as the technology is developed to the next stage.

Example: oil & gas sector - a small 15-person company in Aberdeenshire attended the workshop on Applications of Mathematics in Oil & Gas on March 11th, 2002. At the workshop, a representative of the company outlined a design problem for a transducer currently being developed by the company. The device will use a new method to estimate the ratio of oil and water in wells. It must withstand extreme temperature and pressure fluctuations in this harsh environment, and requires the sensor to be encased in metal housing. The problem was subsequently analysed by mathematicians at the 43rd European Study Group with Industry (April 2nd-5th 2002, Lancaster University). The analysis identified the optimum frequency at which to operate the device, quantified the effect on performance of the housing to allow suitable calibration, and provided insights into the ability of the device to cope with different oil / water geometries. The company has now proceeded to field testing of its device.

Example: textiles sector - a large textiles company based in Grimsby attended the workshop on Applications of Mathematics in Technical Textiles on January 16th 2002. The company manufactures large volumes on non-woven materials to a range of customer specifications. Delays in the production process due to cleaning and reconfiguration of machinery between customer orders incurs substantial cost for the company. At present the process relies on the skill and experience of a single operator. The company thus sought a method of scheduling customer orders that would result in reduced stoppages and less reliance on a single operator. This problem was subsequently analysed by mathematicians at the 43rd European Study Group with Industry (April 2nd-5th 2002, Lancaster University). The analysis resulted in a new algorithm for scheduling customer orders. The algorithm and software are now being further developed as an MSc project in Operations Research at Lancaster University.
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