How Online Quoting Compressed Time for Plastic Injection Molding

Not so long ago, engineers did spend days and weeks in obtaining quotes for a custom plastic injection project. Recently, there has been an innovation in the quotation system. Here, the internet and some very complex online systems are been utilized to automate the quotation process. Hence, the quotation processing time has been drastically compressed to some hours now. This is relatively faster than what was obtainable a couple of years ago.

Why is there a need for speed?

The time it takes for products to be manufactured greatly impacts competitive advantages. Imagine when the multitude of a particular product hit the market in their variations and colors; it will provide customers with multiple choices. However, it goes a long way to say that manufacturers need to design products in real time to be able to meet with the increasing demand for such products.

Plastics, In Particular

Now, it also applies to the plastic injection molding process for the production of a wide variety of plastic products. The need for rapid-production plastic parts and prototype is higher than ever particularly due to the increased demand for high-specification products with short turnaround times. A decrease in the manufacturing speed will greatly affect the plastic industry.

For most manufacturers, there is the need to leverage on the immediacy of the internet to connect and collaborate. 

Online Quotation Systems

So far, new interactive systems have been developed by a handful of the largest custom plastic injection molding companies. These systems are developed with large backend databases which ensures that quotations are provided automatically with little or no human intervention.

One of such companies is ICOMold, headquartered in Holland, Ohio that developed and released its online quotation system. The system is designed to enable customers to upload a CAD file to the system. Choice of specifications such as color, type of plastic material, quantity and finish can be made using the drop-down menus.

After a customer inputs a request, the system then processes this large amount of data and cost information, and automatically returned to the customer as a quote. This way, it means that the customer has to undergo the stress and time of having to explain the ideas. There are multiple options in the online quotation system for customers to source their custom plastic products with relative ease.

Conclusion

Plastic injection molding is one of the most fundamental and yet reliable methods for manufacturing plastic parts. There is a revolution in the process it takes to obtain a quote for a custom plastic injection molding project by the highly innovative tech; the online quotation systems. A clear impact can be seen in the drastic reduction in the production time of plastic parts. Before now, it looked like something that is not achievable but the technology is here now. Some people still wonder if there could be a day when you simply create imagery of a plastic part and it quickly appears. Well, it will always get better.