PROJECT GELATIN

Plantwide Automation Maximizes Production, Minimizes Costs

This gelatin supplier prides itself on the complete traceability of its staged manufacturing process and the variety of gelatins it produces.  Some are ideal for use in pharmaceutical applications such as hard and soft capsules.  The goal for automating the manually controlled plant was to achieve a 40% gain in production while reducing costs.  

Raw materials undergo a complex, multistate process with numerous strict chemical, physical and bacteriological controls. The plant-wide automation system supplied by GCS achieved the desired production gains while maintaining strict controls.

Each end product goes through six stages of processing:

• Raw material pre-treatment
• Raw material preparation
• Gelatin extraction
• Gelatin purification
• Gelatin drying and grinding
• Semi-finished product recovery

GCS working closely with the customer, was able to find efficiencies at every phase.  Automation made it possible to consolidate sequential steps into simultaneous processes, greatly reducing cycle times. GCS implemented efficiencies in the code to minimize the amount of each resource used and maximize the speed of production.  Our controls experts implemented the S-88 batching standard as the core of the system.

The result:  a 10% production gain over previous benchmarks coupled with significant resource savings, translating into increased profits.  Automatically generated production batch records and logs, document the process, provide regulatory compliance and contribute to product quality. Additional reports help pinpoint areas where improvements can be realized, resulting in continuous system optimization.