International. In early March, PPG Refinish launched a new digital ecosystem for the body shop, PPG Linq Pro, which includes PPG VisualizID, PPG DigiMatch, TouchMixUltra, Scales and PaintManager XI Pro in a single kit.
PPG Link PRO, which will add new digital solutions in the coming months and years, will allow workshops to connect, automate and digitize painting processes.
After identifying a contraction of the market that involves the consolidation of the grouping of small workshops into larger ones, and faced with the greater complexity of the repair and shortage of specialist repair technicians, PPG saw the need to reduce the cost to increase profits.
To do this, the company works to reduce cycle time, energy costs and the impact on labor, as it observes that the workshop sells working hours and everything that can reduce this will generate profit to the workshop, which is where more gross margin obtains.
There are four standard repair processes: identification of the color of the paint, preparation of the mixture; Painted -it cannot be digitized in the workshop, but in first equipment-, and guarantee that there are no stock breaks, that there is no lack of paint.
According to the company, with PPG Link Pro, the manufacturer directly attacks the first two and the fourth, reducing the times in identification, preparation and supply of paint. In addition, it manages not only to digitize the process, but also to reduce errors and free up labor time, impacting the profitability of the workshop.
With the traditional method, when the workshop does not perfectly identify the color, it paints a plate and compares the tone of it with the color of the car to validate it, which involves an investment in time, labor and materials.
PPG's digital strategy has focused on reading digital color, so you don't need to paint a color plate to be sure of your color choice.
At the same time, as all its solutions are connected to each other, it takes advantage of the information to perform the mixing automatically (if MoonWalk is available, otherwise, the weighing balance is used) and automatically replenishes the stock so that there are no errors in the references.
PPG Link Pro consists of three large blocks, PPG VisualizID, which allows you to visualize the color in a disruptive way; PPG DigiMatch, whose characteristics allow you to collect all the details necessary to visualize them, and PPG TouchMix Ultra, a device that allows you to visualize the software and collect the information of the spectrophotometer so that the workshop can see it.
The most disruptive part, according to the multinational, is that it is a subscription package that makes it affordable and affordable to any workshop profile.
