Food packaging plants face unique challenges stemming from the need to balance efficiency, sustainability, and safety with labour shortages and consumer and regulatory demands. It’s little surprise that some are turning to technology to address some of these issues, integrating spatial computing and extended reality (XR) with AI and IoT to increase productivity and stay […]
Food packaging plants face unique challenges stemming from the need to balance efficiency, sustainability, and safety with labour shortages and consumer and regulatory demands.
It’s little surprise that some are turning to technology to address some of these issues, integrating spatial computing and extended reality (XR) with AI and IoT to increase productivity and stay competitive.
Headquartered in Australia, TNA Solutions is a global provider of integrated food processing and packaging solutions with a forty-year history of disrupting the sector.
Last October it launched an immersive digital service using extended reality (XR) and simulation to help its customers create digital twins of their plants to support improvements within their facilities before they are implemented on the physical site,
According to TNA’s global XR manager, Natasha Avelange, “tna intelli-assist” is an umbrella term for the firm’s extended reality service, which has started, initially, by focussing on the production and design needs of today’s factory plants.
According to Avelange, TNA’s solution enables multiple stakeholders donning XR headsets to enter a digital replica of their site. Within this world, they’re represented as cartoon-like avatars as they walk around this digital world.
Stakeholders can discuss matters such as where new equipment should be positioned on a factory floor – enabling them to visualise any potential spatial conflicts or utility interferences for clash prevention purposes.
Impact Confections
One of TNA’s pioneering intelli-assist customers is US manufacturer Impact Confections, best known for its sour candy brand Warheads.
Impact is currently upgrading its facilities to maximise production and has partnered with TNA on this pilot project.
The vendor created a digital twin of Impact’s existing factory so that it could import all its new equipment onto the line to visualise how it might integrate into its existing infrastructure and spot any clashes at an early stage.
“It’s quite a challenging location to get access to,” explains Avelange, “So they felt the value of having a model where they can take measurements and examine routes through the factory and assess its safely virtually, as well as bringing in remote people and third parties,” she adds.
According to Avelange, the live model incorporated piping, ductwork, and existing machinery into a twin, enabling the Impact team to visualise the complete system holistically.
Candy is dandy, but digital twins are quicker
Because entering the twin requires no technical expertise and is immediately visual, many project members, from executives to project managers and external partners, could put on their headsets and immediately collaborate in this virtual environment.
Speaking to its inclusivity, Avelange adds: “It’s a visual tool so everyone can understand it; it’s not a tech drawing that a few can understand. It’s like a language that everybody can speak; it’s not about your educational background or position in a company but the work you do and knowledge you have and being able to bring that to the conversation at an earlier stage.”
And several clashes were spotted at this earlier, she adds, including a misplaced ladder and a screw conveyor hitting an HVAC duct.
“The screw conveyor wasn’t initially in the plans, but Impact made some later changes to the layout, and its engineers required them to install a structural beam very close to the equipment,” she recalls.
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“We were able to input these assets into the digital twin and look at how they might interfere – and so were quickly able to make decisions and communicate what needed to be done to avoid this becoming a problem once we got to the actual site.
“Our engineers then redesigned it, re-uploaded the new design, and the customer went into the virtual world to check and validate the changes.”
Impact and TNA also explored the effect that vehicles would have on the new layout.
“We knew there were going to be forklift vehicles moving through a certain part of the factory, so the team was able to use a virtual measuring tool to ensure that certain elements of the machinery were protected and to measure its distance from the wall,” she explains.
She adds that, once inside this virtual world, users can also annotate, circle, and take photos within the twin.
Next step
Avelange notes that TNA’s food and packaging customers invest significant time and resources in upgrading their facilities, calling it a “high-risk endeavour.” She explains that using a visual environment helps save time and money “because you’re able to anticipate more problems.”
While TNA’s XR service’s primary focus is planning and design, Avelange adds that the next step will be to provide training solutions for staff onboarding, skills development, and health and safety.
