Stevens Traceability Systems Ltd (United Kingdom) - Vision Recognition System.

Paterson Arran is a leading manufacturer of biscuits based in Scotland. Established in 1895, Paterson Arran, part of Burton’s Biscuit Co, produces several well-known brands for retailers across the globe. At their production site in Livingston, Paterson Arran have a Stevens paperless traceability system from end-to-end in their factory, from stock in, to goods out.

Challenge:

Paterson Arran approached Stevens as they wanted to implement a process control solution to avoid product recalls and potential hefty fines from incorrect product packaging. They wanted a vision recognition system where the Stevens software would manage and start the process.

Solution:

Stevens Traceability devised a solution whereby the Stevens touch screen terminals send job and product information to an MVC (controller) which in turn shares this data with the vision recognition cameras and printers. An operator would select the job that is about to start on the line and would then be prompted by Stevens to scan all the additions to this job, including the packaging barcode. The scanned barcode is then verified against the barcode stored in Stevens for the current product. If correct, then this barcode and other job information is sent to the vision controller. During production, at the start of the line, the smart camera scans the packaging barcode and this data is sent to the MVC which confirms, based on barcode data fed from Stevens, that the packaging is correct for the job in progress. If correct, the job will proceed with data stored in the MVC sent to the printer which prints codes and best before dates onto the packaging. If the smart camera scans the packaging barcode and it is incorrect, the line is stopped by the MVC.

Result:

Paterson Arran now has better process control using smart cameras to detect correct packaging. This has eliminated incorrect packaging being used giving them peace of mind when it comes to quality control, product recalls and potential costs associated with a product recall. This has also eliminated wrong traceability lot code information from being printed on the packs.