Executive Summary

Manufacturing industry across the globe strives for lowering the cost of production through technology or efficient manufacturing systems and processes. Client is in manufacturing customized conveyor belt systems for manufacturing industries. They wanted a solution for improving the tracking and correct handling of pallets. This would result in saving precious time of the employees that was otherwise wasted in tracking the lost or misplaced pallets.

Vritti Solutions suggested Industry 4.0 based smart solution – Ekatm Conveyor Pallet Tracking Solution – to track the pallets. This solution tracks the pallets’ location in real time with the data relayed to the supervisor’s mobile app and PC. How does this work?

The Challenge

Client is a Conveyor belt manufacturing company. They design customized Conveyor Systems for their clients. They were facing the challenge of tracking the pallets of the customers on the conveyor lines. A lot of time was spent by employees in tracing and locating the pallets. Another challenge was correct handling of the pallets on Conveyor belts

Vritti’s Ekatm Conveyor Pallet Tracking Solution tracks the location of the pallets from loading of pallets from production line to the dispatch location. This tracking is done in real time and is available to the supervisor or manager in-charge on their respective mobile apps or computer. 

Basic schema of the software is very simple. Scanners are attached to the conveyor systems. When the pallets are loaded on the conveyor system, the scanner\PLC reads the signal and starts the conveyor line. PC-based Ekatm Industry 4.0 gets the signal from the PLC and reads the pallet position in real time, as the conveyor line moves. The tracking solution i.e., Industry 4.0 solution, records the location history, the dwelling time at a location, and movement in line with the rules prescribed in the system. Whenever there is a breach in the rules, the system triggers an alert to the supervisor on their mobile app. The operator can also change the direction of the conveyor line movement from clock wise to anti clock wise and vice-versa.

Why Ekatm Conveyor Pallet Tracking Solution?

Using PLC machine data reading to track material movement from production to warehouse is prohibitively expensive. The upfront cost is a deterrent to adopting this technology. However, IoT based effective tracking and monitoring solutions can be installed and operated for four conveyor lines.

The Ekatm Conveyor Pallet Tracking Solution uses multiple layers of device and data security to ensure that your data and IT network are safe. Ekatm data is encrypted end-toend and TOTP (Time-based One Time Password) algorithm data security methods are used to ensure system security.

Benefits

• Real-time location of pallets from the Production line to Dispatch
• Tracking and tracing pallets through mobile app as well
• Employees can better utilize their time into more productive tasks than searching for the lost or misplaced pallets
• Capacity versus Actual Production
• Real Time Reports

Conclusion

For manufacturing companies, knowledge is power. Productivity, efficiency, safety and profits are the four drivers of success. Indoor positioning system using Ekatm Conveyor Pallet Tracking Solution provides this smartness by delivering real time tracking system and end-to-end visibility of all containers, warehouse pallets, and returnable packaging. IoT allows low cost tracking of returnable packaging in indoor environments of large-scale manufacturing environments. Plus, the Ekatm Industry 4.0 solution ensures the safety and security of your devices and IT networks.