Mitsubishi Electric: Automation trends in the packaging industry

Like many other industries, the packaging industry is adapting to changing market requirements under the influence of global factors such as regulation, a shortage of skilled labour and digital transformation. To counter the associated opportunities and risks, the industry is increasingly focussing on solutions such as human-robot collaboration and is making use of artificial intelligence and intensive data processing, among other things.

Diversification, personalisation and ever smaller batch sizes cannot always be handled economically using automated high-speed mass production processes. The corresponding tasks are often outsourced to Contract packer (co-packers), which perform complex processing tasks on small batches and premium packaging with a high level of labour and cost. Conventional industrial robots therefore tend to play a subordinate role in this area.

„Robots are a long way from replacing manual labour in the packaging industry,“ explains Malte Schlüter, Global Key Account Director F&B/CPG at Mitsubishi Electric. „As a fully integrated, intelligent ‚Colleagues‘ but they will make them more ergonomic and efficient. This is no longer a pipe dream, as we already have the technology - and it is economical. The packaging industry is currently characterised by four main trends and will shape the future,“ he emphasises.

Collaborative robots

One clear trend is the increased demand for collaborative robots (Cobots) for direct use alongside humans without protective equipment: „This is not about displacing classic industrial robots, but about their Supplement and additional automation - especially in the co-packing sector,“ says Schlüter.

Equipped with a vision system, cobots relieve humans of monotonous, tiring and physically demanding tasks by, for example, correctly orientating parts or lifting loads. In this way, they increase efficiency and improve the quality of human labour.

Cobots are from the outset for use in close proximity to people This means that they operate with forces and acceleration values that are safe for humans and are defined in the ISO TS15066 safety standard. Mitsubishi Electric is currently developing a new collaborative robot with features such as a surface without the risk of injury from pinching edges, which is also easy to clean and prevents dirt nests. It achieves the same repeat accuracy of ±0.02 millimetres as the manufacturer's industrial robots. The prototypes are still being trialled, but have already been presented to a wider audience at international trade fairs.

Another characteristic of cobots is generally their Simple control and you Low programming effort, which trained persons can take over at the end user's premises. This eliminates the costs for external system integrators or programmers. They can also be used quickly and flexibly in many areas of application in the packaging industry.

The Mitsubishi Electric prototype offers various options for cobot „teaching“, from force-controlled manual movement of the robot arm to the desired position to visual programming and user interfaces on tablets or mobile devices for calibration and parameterisation.

Robots without protective barriers

For industrial robots, the market now demands Alternative security solutions to fences, barriers, cages and cells. After all, these safety precautions take up valuable production space, require a lot of additional cleaning in hygiene areas and rule out any meaningful collaboration with people. Added to this are complex restart procedures after an emergency stop or if protective barriers have been opened.

Alternatively Optical security systems can be used. Laser scanners are widely used to monitor defined zones around the robot. „A special feature at Mitsubishi Electric is the safety-related reduction in the speed of movement of our industrial robots as soon as a human enters their outer zone. When entering the area where there is a risk of direct contact with the robot, it stops immediately,“ says Malte Schlüter, describing the solution.

Instead of being secured with light barriers and laser scanners, entire rooms are increasingly being monitored with camera systems. Systems equipped with artificial intelligence (AI) Vision systems will recognise when and where people enter the robot's workspace and regulate its speed accordingly. In this way, people will soon be able to move freely and safely around robots. Mitsubishi Electric is already working actively with its partners to bring such solutions to market maturity.

Artificial intelligence

In robotics, AI describes the ability to, react appropriately to unforeseen and non-programmable situations. If, for example, a product with a deviation from the standard in terms of position, geometry or packaging is fed to the robot, it will not be able to identify these various irregularities and react accordingly without AI. Robot systems equipped with AI and corresponding vision systems as sensors can now learn to identify these deviations and react accordingly. adapt their processes alternatively. The new MELFA FR robot series is available with AI functions and can increase yields in sectors such as the food industry or life sciences.

AI is also used where intelligent robots recognise quality defects in products to be packaged and replace them with flawless products during the process - even within individual packaging units. Robots that can be moved manually or even mounted on driverless transport systems also quickly recognise their new position and adapt their process sequences.

Data Mining

Against the backdrop of using digitalisation to Overall equipment effectiveness (GAE), there is a great demand for the Analysing extracted data (data mining) from production. The main focus here is on recipe and/or production data for internal evaluation and increasing the GAE.

In addition, the condition and operating profiles of robot components such as the servo drives can be recorded. They provide valuable information on the condition of wear parts and dirt accumulation, for example. The data generated in this way enables strategies for Predictive maintenance with significant savings potential in terms of maintenance costs.

Another important category is process data for traceability and consumer information, particularly in the food sector. This can be used, for example, to prove compliance with the cold chain or to attach origin information to food packaging that can be retrieved via QR code.

„At Mitsubishi Electric, we can collect all data from PLCs, controllers and drives centrally on site and process it using special edge computing technology. This saves us expensive storage space in the cloud and gives us many other advantages. Options for production control and monitoring“, summarises Schlüter.

The German division of the Industrial Automation of Mitsubishi Electric Europe is part of the European Factory Automation Business Group based in Ratingen near Düsseldorf, which in turn belongs to Mitsubishi Electric Europe B. V., a subsidiary of Mitsubishi Electric Corporation, Japan. The German department coordinates sales, service and support through the network of subsidiaries and dealers in Germany, Austria, Switzerland and the Benelux countries.