Animal Nutrition Producer Sees Benefits Throughout Facility

Open Automation SRL created this project for Provimi — a Cargill company located in Venado Tuerto, Santa Fe, Argentina, which is the country’s center of animal production. Provimi provides solutions in applied nutrition for birds, pigs, and cattle. Thanks to its research programs, companies in the Provimi group can offer their customers the most modern animal feeding products and programs.

Provimi had obsolete, disconnected systems, and wanted to upgrade to obtain efficiency, productivity and traceability without increasing labor. Provimi has been using Ignition for five years, and has constantly expanded the software in its operations. With Ignition, Provimi has the ability to get information in a context and format it can use to change and improve the business.

The project uses Ignition Vision Modules to develop a custom Manufacturing Execution System (MES) solution. Ignition delivers information that enables the optimization of production activities from order launch to finished goods. Using current and accurate data, the system initiates, responds to, and reports on plant operations as they occur. The solution includes integration with SAP PP for the transfer of production orders; production programming; raw material stock management; traceability of raw materials and semi-finished products; labeling; and declaration of production to SAP.

The solution collects production data from multiple sectors and operations including raw materials, warehouses, raw material fractioning, blending, quality control, packaging, and logistics. It also integrates easily with PLCs, SCADA, and ERP. The result is complete optimization of visibility, control, and manufacturing throughout the process.

Ignition’s mobile capabilities have brought additional benefits. Using Motorola Handheld, operators now control the raw-materials fractionation process and ensure traceability of the semi-finished materials. They can also print labels with wireless printers.

In the blending area, Ignition guarantees that each raw or semi-finished material that is entered into the mixer is appropriate. A correct scanning of the bar code by the operator is required before the mixing sequence begins. The new process has eliminated human error.

Production reporting is another area in which Provimi has seen improvements since bringing in Ignition. Provimi was able to remove the Excel spreadsheets and various Word documents that operators had to use every day. Ignition also provides remote visibility that allows managers in the corporate office to see numbers, trends, and reports — helping them make better business decisions.

Provimi has seen these benefits with Ignition:

1. Less time spent on data entry, and less paper used
2. Improved production scheduling
3. Visibility throughout the entire production process
4. Blending process safety and reliability
5. Better product and process quality
6. Elimination of non-value-add activities
7. Up-to-the-minute data information for management to evaluate process and products
8. Accelerated trace analysis, root-cause diagnosis, and issue resolution
9. Electronic batch history records
10. Traceability and genealogy

Ignition performed so well, Provimi decided to base the SCADA system of its new production lines on Ignition. The unlimited licensing allows Provimi to extend functionality without increasing costs.

Ignition provides fine-grained control of the new Lines 6 and 7. Each HMI screen extensively uses templates, indirection, and UDTs for rapid development and a high degree of consistency between systems and screens. Valves, motors, analog values, PID loops, and even subsystems use templates and indirect pop-up windows for display and control.