Groundbreakers recognizes manufacturing engineers and citizen developers who are making an impact in their organizations. We received nominations from community members around the world, eager to see different teams and peers be recognized for Golden Shovel and Greenhouse awards. This year, we announced the winners during an award ceremony at Operations Calling.

The Greenhouse Award recognizes manufacturing sites or companies who are empowering their team with digital tools in the spirit of growth and continuous improvement. The recipients of this award have demonstrated operational success across their company or specific manufacturing site in which Tulip played a critical role in achieving production goals. These teams are standouts for scaling their digital transformation, implementing best practices and empowering their workers with the tools they need to achieve continuous improvement.

Winners of the Greenhouse were announced and recognized during an award ceremony at Operations Calling. Winners received priority access to Operations Calling, a collection of premium Tulip swag, and their very own trophy. The following two teams exemplify excellence in their digital journey and demonstrate the power of digital transformation.

In under 8 months, Bloom Energy transformed their operations by replacing their previous MES with Tulip, spanning over 230 stations in their Delaware manufacturing facility. Reflecting Tulip’s commitment to an open ecosystem, Bloom integrated their ERP system with Tulip. As a result, Bloom Energy not only saved labor time required for production control on inventory transactions but also gained precise, real-time data on throughput, costs, and productivity. Although Bloom's centralized project team handled this initial deployment, they are now rolling out a formalized and structured citizen development program that empowers process engineers as well as line leads and supervisors to continue to create innovative Tulip solutions across the company. Embracing Tulip's ethos and remaining committed to the vision for their organization, Bloom Energy has set itself as a benchmark for innovation and digital transformation.

AstraZeneca, alongside Tulip Solution Partner Factorytalk, created an innovative suite of Tulip apps that tackle the challenge of validation for GxP regulated use cases, which is deployed and used across 24 manufacturing sites globally and expanding to additional sites in the coming years. Validation is often burdensome and can be a barrier in GxP digitization projects, however, this simple solution uses Tulip Apps to validate all other Tulip Apps. This standardization significantly reduces the complexity and workload of the validation process when compared to traditional paper-based methods. This has enabled over 200 other Tulip solutions to be deployed, delivering significant cumulative benefit and enabling greater pathways to digitalization at AstraZeneca, and serves as the standard for lean digital applications in the Life Sciences industry.

The Golden Shovel Award acknowledges individuals who have leveraged Tulip and their app-building expertise in creative, and interesting ways to solve problems. These individuals have made significant impact on their business, whether that is leading the implementation process, building out a new use case, or driving adoption of Tulip within their organization.

Winners of the Golden Shovel were announced during an award ceremony at Operations Calling. Winners received priority access to Operations Calling, a collection of premium Tulip swag, and their very own trophy. The following five individuals serve as prime examples of excellence in app building and demonstrate exemplary skills in innovative problem-solving.

During her time at Stanley Black & Decker, Esmeralda has been a driving force in their Reynosa manufacturing site digital transformation journey. Through her leadership of the Manufacturing Data Center (MDC) project, she has leveraged Tulip to develop a suite of apps focused on their key performance indicators SQDCP (Safety, Quality, Delivery, Cost, People). She is not only developing impactful apps using Tulip, but is also dedicated to coaching and mentoring internal developers. Her leadership and expertise empower her colleagues to enhance their skills and embrace new technologies. Esmeralda's dedication to continuous improvement is evident in her proactive use of data-driven insights and employee feedback to refine processes and achieve better outcomes. She is passionate about enabling her colleagues and promoting the use of Tulip within the organization, and her commitment to being a Tulip advocate makes her a prime example of embracing digital transformation in the workplace.

In the past 3 years, Hivzo has been at the forefront of transforming how Novo Nordisk manages its equipment and room logbooks. What was once a paper-based process, is now a simple and effective Tulip app used by over 6,200 users globally. The scale of this solution is impressive and enhances Novo Nordisk’s regulatory compliance and eliminates paper waste from the previous process. Not only is Hivzo making huge impacts at Novo Nordisk, but he is also helping shape the future of Tulip in the Life Sciences industry. He actively engages with the Tulip Community, sharing product suggestions and feedback to enhance the platform for all users. As he continues to drive digital transformation at Novo Nordisk, logbooks are just the beginning for Hivzo, as he plans to scale to new use cases for Tulip.

Those who know him say Dan is an expert practitioner of Tulip. Daniel has revolutionized numerous shop floor applications at Stanley Black & Decker's Hellaby facility in England. These applications track production, scrap, OEE, asset energy consumption, and more, providing real time metrics to drive actionable insights. He has also developed a tiered management dashboard which brings together all of the information, data, and insights into a single, easy to read dashboard. By bringing data visibility and real-time process monitoring to the frontline, he has brought this older facility into the digital age. Daniel's forward-thinking extends beyond Hellaby as he collaborates with European sites to propel digital transformation. Known for his fun holiday-themed apps, Daniel advocates for Tulip as a transformative and enjoyable tool for users.

At VEKA, Ryan focuses on driving impactful applications and integrations that directly benefit frontline operators. By understanding operator pain points and bringing his creativity to Tulip, Ryan has brought about continuous improvement across VEKA. For example, Ryan tackled the challenge of managing Certificates of Analysis from VEKA’s vendors. By developing an application with Frontline Copilot, he created a dynamic worklog that associates testing results with vendors, eliminating the need for users to memorize vendor-specific requirements. The results have been transformative, cutting processing time by over 50%, allowing the team to focus on more strategic tasks while enhancing compliance and strengthening vendor relationships.Ryan's digital initiatives have streamlined processes, reduced manual labor time, and minimized errors, making a tangible difference for operators and supervisors alike.

Having successfully deployed Tulip across multiple production lines and manufacturing sites at Generac, Steve’s forward-thinking approach and deep understanding of Tulip’s capabilities are evident. Steve utilized Tulip to support Generac’s digitalization of manufacturing processes, creating apps to shift several procedures from paper-based to digital. He recognizes the power of creating a system tailored to individual needs, rather than being constrained by rigid monolithic systems. Steve is also one of the most prolific users of Tulip Automations and Frontline Copilot. As a beta-tester for Automations, Steve collaborated closely with Tulip to improve the platform not just for Generac but for all users of Tulip. His creative problem-solving, adaptability, and collaboration with the Tulip team helped him drive true digital transformation at Generac.

Congratulations to our winners! On behalf of Tulip, we thank you for your extraordinary efforts and contributions to the future of frontline operations. We can't wait to see what you will do next!

If you aren’t a member yet, be sure to join the Tulip Community and get support or feedback as you take on your digital transformation journey.