WAM Tech Talks 4.0 - Interview with Georg SCHULZE-DÜRR

 

• Can you briefly introduce your company and its core expertise within the industrial and manufacturing sector?

3R Solutions is a global provider of smart manufacturing and automation solutions for industrial pipe fabrication.

With more than 40 years of experience, we support industrial companies in transforming traditional production environments into future-ready, highly efficient manufacturing operations. This long-standing expertise allows us to combine proven industrial know-how with next-generation digital technologies.

Our focus is on enabling productivity gains, cost reduction, and workforce transformation by integrating automation, intelligent software, and data-driven decision-making. We help manufacturers reduce dependency on scarce skilled labor while creating safer, more attractive and sustainable workplaces.

By delivering fully integrated smart factory concepts, we align material flow, production, and digital transparency to support strategic objectives such as operational excellence, resilience, and long-term competitiveness - fully aligned with Vision 2030 and Industry 5.0.

 

 

• What key challenges do your solutions address for manufacturers and industrial operators today?

Today, manufacturers and industrial operators are under growing pressure to increase efficiency and productivity while simultaneously facing skilled labor shortages, rising operating costs, and increasing production complexity.

Our solutions directly address these challenges by enabling measurable manpower savings, improving operational reliability, and significantly reducing errors through software-driven automation. This allows companies to stabilize output, even in an environment where qualified labor is scarce.

Beyond efficiency, we support a fundamental transformation of the shop floor. Physically demanding and error-prone tasks are converted into safer, more structured, and more attractive workplaces, helping companies retain talent and position themselves as modern, future-oriented employers.

A key shift is that decisions on the shop floor are no longer dependent on individual experience alone. Instead, intelligent software acts as a digital backbone, dynamically coordinating machines, workflows, and material flow in real time. Resources are utilized at their optimal capacity, workplaces are clearly organized, and idle time caused by missing material or poor coordination is eliminated.

In this way, our solutions enable manufacturers to move toward smart factories aligned with Industry 5.0 and Vision 2030 - combining efficiency, resilience, and human-centric automation into a sustainable competitive advantage.

 

• How do your technologies support efficiency, sustainability, or operational optimisation across industrial processes?

Our technologies support efficiency, sustainability, and operational optimisation by establishing a streamlined digital super-structure that seamlessly connects engineering, planning, and production into one coherent workflow.

Through automation and the use of digital twins, we significantly reduce manual intervention, rework, and material waste. This leads to more predictable operations, higher productivity, and improved cost control, while at the same time supporting a more responsible and sustainable use of resources.

The impact extends well beyond the shop floor. We help industrial operators optimise the entire fabrication ecosystem, including downstream activities such as inspection, quality assurance, and surface treatment. In many industrial environments, the greatest losses are not caused by the processes themselves, but by inefficient organisation, poor coordination, and lack of transparency between process steps.

By addressing these gaps, our solutions reduce idle time, improve throughput, and enable data-driven operational decisions across the full value chain. This allows manufacturers to move from reactive production to structured, resilient, and scalable operations.

 

• Which industries or sectors benefit most from your solutions, and why?

In simple terms, our solutions create the greatest value in industries where complex piping systems are mission-critical to operations.

This includes sectors such as energy and power generation, oil and gas, refining, shipbuilding, pharmaceuticals, food and beverage, and other process-driven industries. Across these sectors, operators face similar challenges: high coordination effort, strict quality and safety requirements, and increasing pressure to deliver projects faster and more cost-effectively.

Wherever complexity is high and reliability is non-negotiable, our software-driven approach delivers the strongest impact. We help industrial operators standardise and orchestrate complex processes, reduce dependency on scarce skilled labour, and significantly improve operational predictability and consistency.

The result is a more efficient, resilient, and scalable production environment, enabling companies to maintain high quality standards while improving productivity and long-term competitiveness.

 

 

• What differentiates your company from other solution providers in the global industrial market?

What truly differentiates 3R Solutions is that we do not focus on individual tools or machines, but on the entire digital process around piping.

We combine deep industry experience with proprietary software that connects engineering, planning, production, and execution into a single, coherent workflow. This holistic approach allows us to address complexity at a system level, rather than optimising isolated steps.

Unlike many solution providers, we are vendor-neutral and highly configurable. We do not represent specific machine brands or follow a fixed manufacturer catalogue. This gives us the freedom to select the best-fit technologies for each project and adapt them to the customer’s operational reality - not the other way around.

As a result, our customers benefit from measurable manpower savings, higher process reliability, and predictable outcomes, while building a scalable foundation for future-ready manufacturing environments.

In short, we act as a strategic transformation partner, enabling industrial operators to move confidently toward the next generation of smart, resilient production.

 

• Why did you choose to participate in WAM Saudi, and what opportunities does the Saudi market present for your business?

We chose to participate in WAM Saudi because it is a focused platform that brings together industrial decision-makers and transformation leaders shaping the future of manufacturing in the region.

Saudi Arabia is a highly attractive market for us, driven by its strong industrial base, large-scale projects, and the clear strategic direction defined by Vision 2030. Many manufacturers are now moving from expansion to modernisation and productivity-driven transformation.

Our solutions strongly support these goals by helping industrial operators increase efficiency, reduce manpower dependency, and upgrade existing facilities through software-driven automation. In this way, we actively contribute to the Kingdom’s ambition to build resilient, competitive, and future-ready industrial capabilities in line with Vision 2030.

 

• How does WAM Saudi align with your growth strategy in the Middle East and international markets?

WAM Saudi aligns very well with our growth strategy because it connects us with regional industrial leaders, EPCs, and project owners who are actively investing in modernisation and automation.

The Middle East - and Saudi Arabia in particular - represents an important growth market, driven by large-scale industrial projects, long-term investment horizons, and the transformation agenda under Vision 2030. These dynamics create strong demand for software-driven productivity improvements and smart manufacturing concepts.

At the same time, many projects in the region are closely linked to global supply chains, which allows us to combine regional activities with our international experience and capabilities.

In this context, WAM Saudi supports our growth strategy by enabling long-term cooperation, pilot initiatives, and scalable implementations across both regional and international markets.