Innovative for Technologies
1. Artificial intelligence promotes quality
Incorporating digital into our processes enables us to save time, optimize our resources, and enhance our production activities. There is a prerequisite – we need to get employees on board well in advance of designing a new tool.
Frédéric Gauvard, Director of Digital Transformation at Arkema
IN BRIEF...
1.ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE PROMOTES QUALITY
How can we automatically detect non-quality in finished products? By combining optics and deep learning. Bostik has rolled out this solution on its manufacturing lines for hot-melt adhesives in the Netherlands. Artificial intelligence is paired with a camera system that learns to recognize faults (bubbles, black specks, non-compliant packaging). With the automation of quality control, operators are freed up to devote themselves to other more valuable tasks, which improves workstation ergonomics.
2.MAINTENANCE: BEST TO BE PREPARED
Digital allows us to optimize supervision programs that guarantee the integrity of our industrial facilities. This is the purpose of Risk Based Inspection, a predictive maintenance system deployed on several sites in France, the Netherlands, India and Italy. It offers significant gains in terms of the availability and reliability of facilities by detecting the risk of part failure and wear. Feedback from process technology engineers and maintenance engineers in the plants is used to improve the system.
3.LETTING THE DATA TALK
Data processing and analysis are at the heart of digital transformation. Philippe Kemikian, Project Manager for Digital Manufacturing, sums it up: “We want to allow production staff to utilize the data generated by industrial equipment. New digital solutions are letting us process and analyze it without the need for specific programming skills. We expect it to have a significant impact on the way we run our facilities and monitor the equipment.”
4.ASSESSING RISK EXPOSURE FACTORS THROUGH SMART CLOTHING
Elite sportsmen and women are already familiar with smart clothing to monitor their vital signs such as pulse rate, and now it is being used in our plants too. These intelligent clothes can communicate information about the body to objectively measure the difficulty of performing a task, using data on posture. Arkema’s plant in Serquigny (France) has implemented this method successfully. The aim is to promote safe movements to prevent injuries, adapt workstation ergonomics, and make it easier to return to work after sick leave.