Elly Yates-Roberts |
PepsiCo products are consumed more than one billion times a day by people in more than 200 countries and territories, making it one of the world’s largest food and beverage companies. Meeting such a huge level of demand, all day every day, requires constant innovation.
Its commitment to improvement led PepsiCo to look for ways to reduce machine downtime. The failure of a critical machine can bring an entire production line to a halt, causing disruption in supply and creating unnecessary costs that impact overall business performance.
“We’re always looking for ways to get even smarter and more efficient in manufacturing, including ways to reduce machine downtime to enable greater productivity,” said Clark Michael, supply chain director for PepsiCo. “With the technology in this space rapidly advancing, we set out to identify a breakthrough start-up in partnership with our technology venturing arm.”
This search led them to Augury, whose Machine Health solution uses IoT and AI to predict and prevent machine failures and improve machine performance.
“Augury’s solution helps us monitor critical equipment and gather data on heat, vibration, magnetic fields and more,” said Michael. “Augury then analyses all of the data and provides actionable insights into the health of the machines, enabling us to mitigate any potential issues before they happen.”
PepsiCo piloted Augury’s Machine Health solution in four of its Frito-Lay manufacturing plants and soon began seeing an impact on production.
“There was improved performance in terms of reduced unexpected breakdowns, interruptions, and incremental costs for replacement parts on the monitored assets,” says Michael. “In addition to this enhanced productivity, importantly, it has enabled a better work experience for our associates so they can focus on delivering quality products for consumers.”
With this proven success, PepsiCo and Augury have begun expanding the use of this technology. Machine Health is now used in many Frito-Lay plants in the United States.
“Our partnership with Augury has been a great collaboration between our teams,” says Michael. “Augury helped us move even faster to implement this project. By leveraging Augury’s breakthrough technology and rapid speed of working, we were able to move quickly from contract to implementation to embed their technology in our Frito-Lay manufacturing sites.”
Watch the video to learn how PepsiCo Labs and Augury save snacks weighing a total of one million pounds: https://labs.pepsico.com/news
This article was originally published in the Summer 2021 issue of The Record. To get future issues delivered directly to your inbox, sign up for a free subscription.