Duggan Systems Partners With BM Aluminium

At the time, LogiKal represented a major investment for the window and curtain walling specialist, but it has gone on to become an integral part of Duggan’s business, repaying that investment many times over.

Managing Director John Duggan says: “We’ve created our own bespoke version of LogiKal over the years which helps us manage every element of our process from quotation right through to production and labelling.

“We started on a fairly small scale in 2007, but by 2010/11 we were really starting to get the full benefit. LogiKal has certainly grown with us, and we’re constantly adding valuable new functionality every time new updates are released from the developers Orgadata.”

Duggan Systems fabricates in a mix of Reynaers, AMS and Schueco profiles along with many of its own systems, so it makes perfect sense for it to use a software package like LogiKal which is capable of switching seamlessly between all of them.

The company uses the standard data sets but adjusts them to suit the specific way that it uses the profile sections, and has also integrated its own in-house unitised curtain walling system. This, John Duggan adds, is relatively straightforward thanks to the intuitive way that LogiKal works.

BM Aluminium and Duggan Systems have remained close partners since the supply of the software, and the programming team at BM Aluminium’s Tewkesbury head office are in regular contact with the design and manufacturing departments in Co Limerick, advising on new aspects of the software.

Over the years, the BM Aluminium team have also helped to train Duggan Systems’ staff on the software and provide a service which John Duggan describes as ‘hugely helpful’.

One of the key areas where BM Aluminium continues to support is in the linking of Duggan’s machinery. Three CNC machining centres, including a recently added 12 axis Emmegi Quadra, and two CNC saws have all been linked to LogiKal, meaning that set ups and optimisation are all carried out automatically.

Duggan Systems believes that the fact that LogiKal has been able to keep pace so easily with its expansion over the past decade or so has been a critical element in its success.

The Irish construction market has bounced back strongly from the 2009 collapse and Duggan Systems has been at the very forefront of that recovery, growing rapidly and expanding across the whole of Ireland and even into the US.

The company has seen turnover increase from €19m in 2015 to an estimated €33m in 2017, and it is currently producing 800m² of windows and doors per week, alongside 2000m² of curtain walling and 600m² of unitised curtain walling.

Dean Hodges, Managing Director of BM Aluminium, is understandably delighted that LogiKal has proven itself in such an intense environment. He says: “Duggan Systems is a great example of how our software can grow with a business and provide the framework for even the most ambitious expansion programme.

“The company’s reputation has been built on the quality of its design and the short lead times associated with its manufacturing and LogiKal makes a major contribution towards that. Because it is constantly being updated, it is able to do everything Duggans asks of it, and more.”