Nestlé pioneered the concept of soluble coffee, and sixty percent of their soluble coffee production comes from a single factory. At their Nescafé plant in Toluca, Mexico, one million jars of coffee roll off…
BPX Product News & Insights
Automation transforms medical device assembly
The development of new medical devices for diagnostics, healthcare, pharmaceutical and biotechnology applications also needs innovative production systems. In this artacile, we take a look at how ‘Automation transforms medical device assembly’.
Designing and building…
Remote Condition Monitoring Minimises Plant Power Outages
Manufacturers and commercial organisations rely on the availability of their electrical distribution systems to keep operating. Failures are infrequent and difficult to foresee, but when they do happen, the fiscal impact is significant.
Multi-tasking Machine Controllers for IIoT Machines
IIoT is all about communication, and the latest machine controllers are at the heart of this new extended infrastructure. Machine controllers were part of the operational technology (OT), but this is changing. Now, the…
How to go from Legacy System to Industry 4.0 on a Budget
The digitalisation of manufacturing towards Industry 4.0 can enable advanced predictive maintenance, bottleneck prevention and optimisation. Yet the challenge for most producers is how to move from a legacy system to Industry 4.0 on…
What is the new Sick Monitoring Box all about?
Unplanned downtime is by its nature unpredictable, as well as expensive. For many producers, it results in lost production, scrap materials, missed deadlines and emergency repairs. One way to help predict problems is by…
Where Schneider Electric leads, will others follow?
Most end users rely on more than one automation supplier to build a solution and the need for cost-effective interoperability and integration is strong. Obstacles like the lack of openness of hardware technologies and…
How Edge Processing Leverages IIoT Production Data
Deploying edge processing for efficient data management boosts responsiveness, productivity, and flexibility on the factory floor. It is the key to enhanced IIoT competitiveness and ensuring the successful deployment of modern automation systems.
Jeremy Shinton,…
Analytics Software Achieves Unprecedented Productivity
IIoT benefits like faster time to market, optimising workforce knowledge, increasing productivity, lowering downtime and analytics software have taken time to become practical solutions that benefit OEMs. According to Schneider Electric, EcoStruxure Machine…
Machine Retrofit Reduces Scrappage and Improves Quality
Machines in food and beverage production must be dependable, safe, fast, and maintain production quality over years, if not decades. For older equipment, a machine retrofit to update the control automation provides a cost…
Time Sensitive Networking removes Ethernet Limitations
Information Technology (IT) is becoming a key part of manufacturing operations and we are seeing more convergence between the factory floor and high-level IT levels. Time Sensitive Networking (TSN) offers an interesting way to…
Is a middle layer the key to IT/OT integration?
Moving data between IT and OT systems is a key element of digital integration, but far from straightforward for most manufacturers. Is a middle layer the key to IT/OT integration between the plant floor…
Predicting the future simplifies maintenance
Initiative-taking maintenance is vital for manufacturing operations. As producers know, keeping production lines and systems running well takes more than a skilled maintenance team. It also takes careful planning, scheduling, monitoring, a willingness to…
Why Smart Controllers are Driving Smart Manufacturing
OEM machine builders now find themselves at the heart of the industrial digitisation revolution. New generations of smart controllers are at the heart of smart machines, and the smart machines they build are the…
Manufacturing Digitisation with Edge Box – Part 2
Part one of this article looked at ways smart machine solutions can bolster manufacturing flexibility. Here we look at how one manufacturer put this into practice using Schneider Electric’s IIoT Edge…
Manufacturing Digitisation Bolsters Flexibility – Part 1
Manufacturers are experiencing interesting times as the pandemic has affected workforce availability and consumer demand. Moreover, with a shortage of skilled staff and increased material and energy costs, they need to adapt to survive….
Getting Closer To Robots Improves Safety & Productivity
Over recent years, robots have simplified social distancing and allowed manufacturers to protect human operators whilst maintaining high production throughput. However, getting closer to robots can…
Time Sensitive Networking in Manufacturing Automation
There is much hype about one of the most significant and transformational developments in standard Ethernet technology – Time Sensitive Networking (TSN). Enabling technology for industrial communications, it delivers Information and Operational Technologies (IT/OT)…
The First Steps to becoming a Digital Factory
The promise of Industry 4.0 and IIoT is one of digital technology delivering massive profits for manufacturers. Tech sites lavish praise on the latest connected and synchronised devices running 24/7 in smart factories across…
Embedded Automation Computer Updates Presses for IoT
For Tier 1 automotive parts suppliers, product quality and delivery performance are essential for retaining their position. Advantech’s new generation UNO-2000 embedded automation computers enable manufacturers to upgrade existing machine controls to provide reliable…