Tetra Pak launches Plant Secure aiming to enhance “smart manufacturing”

11 Oct 2018 --- Tetra Pak has launched Tetra Pak Plant Secure at its Inside Tetra Pak event held yesterday at the company’s headquarters in Lund, Sweden. PackagingInsights was at the event covering the launch. Tetra Pak Plant Secure is a plant management service that aims to deliver profitability improvements for its customers. Leveraging Tetra Pak’s investments in Industry 4.0 technologies, the service uses data-driven analytics and Tetra Pak’s industry expertise to identify and deliver improvements across a customer’s entire value chain.

Pilot projects have been carried out in the Americas and Europe, delivering results that are above customer expectations. For example, an Americas-based dairy producer reduced operational costs by more than 10 percent in the first year of implementation, and the project continues to deliver further savings. 

Speaking at the launch, Johan Nilsson, Vice President Tetra Pak Services explained, “Food and beverage manufacturing is about controlling quality on output. Often it is done with random checks but this is very costly, and things can be easily missed.”

“By being more systematic in this and doing process control - through leveraging digital technologies - it will bring a more effective and efficient quality management process. Doing the right things in the right way, so you are not spending too much on achieving too little. This will bring safer food more cost-effectively,” he adds.

Click to Enlarge

The new service starts with a detailed audit of all the equipment and systems across the customer’s value chain. This analysis, combined with Tetra Pak’s knowledge of the industry and benchmark data on food manufacturing, enables its specialists to identify opportunities and implement improvements across the customer’s entire operation. All Tetra Pak Plant Secure contracts come with targets around operational expenditure reduction and capital expenditure optimization. 

“Our investment in Industry 4.0 technologies such as artificial intelligence, automation, and data velocity has enabled us to support our customers in the digital era better. Tetra Pak Plant Secure is a great example of how we use new technology to broaden our perspective and deliver bottom-line benefits for our customers,” says Dennis Jönsson, President and CEO of Tetra Pak Group.

Tetra Pak Plant Secure is being rolled out to food and beverage companies around the world, and its technology is compatible with machines from all manufacturers.

Speaking at the launch, Henrik Nilsson, Business Development Manager Food Safety and Quality Services at Tetra Pak explained how the system could benefits manufacturers.

Click to Enlarge

“Retailers are putting higher demands on customers at the moment. If there is one bad product in a truck full, it may be sent back. Social media also means brands can be made or broken through posts. There is a lot to lose, and companies need to be adapting their processes.”  

“New technologies can help us help the customer make better conclusions and preventative actions. Industry 4.0 helps us do this in a perfect way,” he explains.

“Traceability is when our customers have control of the raw materials from the supplier to the end consumer. If there is a problem, they would know exactly which pellet to recall, instead of calling back the whole batch.”

What is “Industry 4.0”?
Industry 4.0 is about “smart manufacturing”: fully-integrated collaborative systems that respond in real time to meet changing demands and conditions in the factory. It is where automation combines with IT networks and systems – enriched through live and constantly available data and analytics – to drive operations more efficiently.

At the Inside Tetra Pak event, the speakers made it clear that the Food and Beverage industry is ready for industry 4.0. 

The market is seeing increasing amounts of price pressures, due to issues such as e-commerce players extending into the groceries market, discount brand such as LIDL becoming popular and retailers launching private label to compete with these issues, they explained.

Click to Enlarge

However, the issue was during the event as to whether the utilization of Industry 4.0 may lead to the reduction in manual jobs for people. In response, Nilsson explained that “it is not the purpose, but it may be a future consequence. Certain types of jobs or activities or tasks in the process may change. The ‘lights out factory’ is not in the near future nor realistic, but a reduction in certain monotone jobs may be realistic. This happened 25 years ago with the introduction of robots. Looking at the automation industry, does a car company have fewer employees now than it did then? No it does not – but many jobs have changed in nature. Education will become increasingly important.”

Industry 4.0 comes as the fourth leap for the industry. The first is the industrial revolution; the second is electricity, the third is computer power in the production process and the fourth is the digitalization of manufacturing to respond to change and enhance productivity.

It is time for the industry to catch up with the changing world, they stated.

By Laxmi Haigh

To contact our editorial team please email us at editorial@cnsmedia.com