Novozyme Leverages Results Oriented Maintenance and Highly Motivated Staff to Win the North American Maintenance Excellence (NAME) Award 2000
Michael Lippig, IDCON INC
Novozymes North America, Franklinton, North Carolina, a company with Scandinavian roots and management style won the coveted North American Maintenance Excellence Award (NAME) 2000. A reporter (Michael Lippig) recently paid Owe Forsberg, Maintenance Manager, Novozymes North America, a visit to see how this came about.
How it Started
Novozymes did not actively pursue benchmarking in the past. “For a long time our organization was introspective. We thought we had everything we needed in house and that we could do it all ourselves” continues Mr. Forsberg. “In 1999, we set a goal to benchmark ourselves against other industries, to get an outside perspective.” It was in this context that the organization decided to apply for the name award.
Related Articles
Maintenance Management Legends
There are many paradigms and legends surrounding maintenance management in plants. Often, the legends are known to be untrue, but people live with them because it is politically correct, or simply convenient. To be successful in improving equipment reliability and maintenance management, plants must break the legends that exist in their organizations. Some of the legends will be addressed in this article. You may find that these legends are uncomfortably close to describing how your plant operates.
A Plan for Breaking Out of Maintenance Budget Jail
I wrote this column for those who want to improve equipment reliability but feel as if they are stuck in “budget jail”. Assuming your fiscal year starts January 1, November and December is the time to plan your jailbreak! Most of you understand what I mean by budget jail. In fact, you are probably in the process of trying to pick the lock. For those who don’t know what I mean, I’ve listed some signs of what a budget jail look likes...
Maintenance Crisis Song
The Maintenance Crisis Song written by Joel Leonard and Performed by Harley & the Hot Spots.
Building Maintenance and Management: AI Checks in 2026
Building maintenance has always relied on data, but 2026 finds the industry at a crossroads between "AI hype" and "Industrial AI" reality. While marketing noise often conflates maintenance tools with general language models like ChatGPT or Gemini, true industrial systems require a different architecture focused on precision, not probability.
The Japanese Path to Maintenance Excellence
In August 2002 I spent a week in Japan at the chemical plant of an internationally renowned chemical manufacturer. While there I asked them about how they do their maintenance. They told me about their maintenance philosophy. And I want to pass on to you what I learnt about the Japanese way of doing maintenance on that trip.
Leadership in Maintenance Weekly/Daily Operations and Maintenance Meetings
Daily and weekly meetings between operations and maintenance are crucial in taking the efficiency of your daily maintenance to a higher level. Coordinating meetings where various departments prioritize work orders (WO) and maintenance is the foundation for a partnership between operations and maintenance. Such meetings create efficiency. Well-organized meetings with clear goals and agendas can completely change the culture for the better in an organization.
Leveraging BIM for Enhanced Maintenance: A New Era in Facility Management
Over the past twenty years, building information modeling (BIM) has been steadily securing itself as an essential tool in the architecture, engineering, and construction fields. Its advanced 3D capabilities are used in just about every design and construction phase. However, with new developments in real-time data collection, the advantages of BIM can extend beyond the completion of a facility.When applied to facility management, BIM opens the door to better asset management, improved safety, and optimized maintenance strategies that ensure that a building performs at its best 100 percent of the time.
