Case Study: Hemlock Semiconductor Operations lowers costs and optimizes production with Spotfire

Hemlock Semiconductor Operations saves $300K a month with Spotfire

Hemlock Semiconductor Operations (HSC), a global producer of polycrystalline silicon, faced significant challenges in the highly competitive polysilicon market. As a commodity, pricing was inflexible, requiring HSC to tightly control its manufacturing costs while ensuring near-perfect product purity levels of 99.999999999 percent. The company needed to optimize its complex production process, reduce energy consumption, and break down data silos from legacy systems to drive continuous improvement and maintain its market leadership.

HSC implemented analytics software from vendor Spotfire to gain a data-centric view of its operations. The solution provided real-time process monitoring, custom data visualizations, and alerting to quickly detect anomalies and pinpoint causes. This enabled HSC to proactively manage production, optimize energy usage through a peak power management program, and sell the right product quality to the appropriate market segment. The vendor Spotfire helped HSC achieve monthly savings of approximately $300,000 in electricity costs, significantly improve decision-making speed, and foster a data-driven culture across the organization.

Hemlock Semiconductor Operations (hsc)