Master Planning

New construction, expansion, or revitalization:
Master planning paves the way into this future

Historically grown building structures, inefficient processes, and limit space for growth – many companies face major operational challenges when significant changes to the production program are imminent or when significant sales growth is expected. Throughout these operational changes, the management team is often faced with the following questions:

How much sales growth can be achieved with existing structures?
How will new technologies affect the existing layout?
What is the potential for optimization and how can it be realized?
What are the costs of structural and process-related improvement measures?

We at Dr. Schönheit + Partner have more than 25 years of practical experience in the master planning of production site and industrial buildings. For a holistically thought master plan we combine experts from different disciplines such as factory planning, architecture and project management. Our experts will work with you to develop a master plan that builds on existing structures and leads to your individual solution.

Your contact

Markus Honscheid

Senior Manager

Clear objectives, flexible implementation

We base our master plan on your existing site structures and resources, as well as your mid- to long-tern business objectives. Building onto this, we jointly define a step-by-step plan to develop your production site giving you the flexibility to adjust production output while protecting your budget. At the same time, we consider the requirements of the different stakeholders from your operational processes.

As a result, we define and develop flexible, modular, sustainable and expandable industrial buildings and facilities. In this way, we ensure that your plant is designed to last for decades to come.

At the same time, we harmonize your plans with urban planning requirements, as authorities often have their own master plan in place. Thereby, we can address and resolve conflicting goals early in the planning process.

The 5 elements of a comprehensive master plan

A comprehensive master plan considers all the internal and external factors that are expected to affect your location over a defined period of time. To keep the complexity manageable, we focus on those areas that have proven to be strategically relevant to your success. Depending on the size, location and dynamics of the change, there may be more or fewer aspects to consider. It is not the scope of the master plan that determines its quality: what matters to us is its comprehensibility, its practical applicability and the stability of the underlying forecasts.

1. System architecture

The system architecture describes the required material and information flows within your production system. We do this by creating a strategic overview of how the factory functions. This allows you to see at a glance how the different areas within the factory or logistics system relate to another. The interrelationships and dependencies of the system are visualized through material flows, information flows, and control principles which help to derive the long-term master plan.

2. Storage and transportation technology

Choosing the right storage technology is the key to sizing your warehouse in terms of performance, future storage space, and investment. The logistics connection is dimensioned according to customer availability requirements. From the warehouse to production, for example, this can be done via milk run/AGV technology. The goal is to avoid empty runs. Structured material and information flows from incoming goods to finished product shipping, as well as standardized workstations, allow for maximum volume flexibility.

3. Urban master plan

The creation of the urban master plan illustrates the vision for the future use of the site and its integration into the surrounding area. It is also the basis for discussions with local authorities. All functions, outdoor facilities and expansions are shown in the master plan, including floor area details. Several stages of expansion are shown in an implementation plan with milestones, distinguishing between planning and implementation periods. In addition, we prepare a cost framework for each expansion stage in accordance with DIN 276, so that you always have an overview of the financial implications.

4. Economic feasibility assessment

The target system defined with you at the beginning of the project is an important part of the master plan design. These guidelines provide the framework for our profitability assessment, which compares costs and savings potentials. A payback period of less than 10 years for factory planning projects is realistic in most cases. Throughout the planning process, costs and savings are regularly reviewed. This gives you full cost control and transparency of savings potential at all times.

5. Volume model

The 2030+ master plan is intended and designed as a long-term site development strategy. This means that possible expansion steps for your buildings are planned ahead and are executed upon necessity in targeted manner. The requirements for these expansion steps are determined based on the corporate strategy, the long-term forecast for the production program and future logistical requirements. In our planning the architecture follows the optimal utilization requirements, which are combined to form an intelligent, cohesive whole. The result is the visual representation in the master plan as a vision of the possible future development and use of the site. This gives you a concrete idea of how your site will look in the future.

The 3 phases of master planning: analyze, conceptualize, plan

We plan the factory of the future for you and with you – from the inside out. We start by working with you to evaluate alternatives of factory development. The design of your factory is determined by your future production program and the lean processes that enable it. The result is a versatile, modular and transparent factory that puts people first and keeps processes simple and focused on customer value.