All part of the process

By its very nature, the practice of process engineering rarely takes place in isolation. Upstream and downstream activities link into the process to form a co-ordinated chain from raw material to finished product.

According to exit data compiled after the first TOTAL exhibition in 2004, a significant number of the executives who visited the show were responsible for both processing and packaging within their companies.

This echoed the results achieved by a similar poll at the 2003 PPMA (the Processing and Packaging Machinery Association) show which demonstrated 35% of visitors claiming responsibility for both functions.

Since the theme of Total then — and in its new incarnation in 2007 — is the integration of processing and packaging, it’s probably just as well that the visitors seem to agree with the organisers’ objectives.

The same strong emphasis on convergence is evident in this year’s PPMA event, which takes place at the National Exhibition Centre in Birmingham on 27-29 September.

Looked at objectively, there seems to be every reason why this convergence should take place. After all, nothing in modern manufacturing happens, or should happen, in isolation. It is a moot point whether the process determines the nature of the packaging or vice versa.

Nowhere is this more true than in the modern growth sectors: food, pharmaceuticals and personal care products, where process parameters such as temperature, viscosity and solids content might be specified not to improve the process but to simplify or improve the quality or efficiency of the packaging operation.

So, the logic is that the boundaries will continue to become increasingly blurred. But, is that the way it works out in the real world?

To find out, we talked to three companies who can legitimately claim to have a strong foothold in both camps.

Alan Johnson is a product manager for Loma Systems of Farnborough, one of the world's leading manufacturers of food inspection systems — metal detectors, X-ray inspection, check-weighers and non-invasive temperature measurement.

‘We operate principally in the food and pharmaceutical sectors and have equipment which sits in both processing and packaging,’ he says.

‘There is a definite trend for the equipment to be installed on the process side for HACCP (Hazard Analysis Critical Control Point) where it is used as a mechanism for assessing risk at key, or sensitive, points of the process upstream of the packaging lines.‘

The logic behind this is inescapable. By the time a product is ready for packaging all or most of its value has been added to it. If the only detection system is sited at the end of the process line then, logically, all of that value is lost if contamination is detected. It makes much more sense to identify and intercept any contamination at key stages prior to packaging.

‘The convergence in disciplines is even more noticeable when we consider the people we are dealing with on the customer side. I can point to a major cereal producer, for instance, where the lines between the process and packaging disciplines — which traditionally were kept totally separate — are rapidly becoming blurred. In my experience, the approach now is a much more holistic one with the principal aim being to optimise the process. Therefore, we now find one person who is responsible for the whole process. It makes sense and, of course, it puts paid to those old situations where, when something went wrong, the packaging department would blame process and vice versa. So, I think it would be fair to say that we do see a clear convergence of the two functions and I am happy to see this trend reflected in the PPMA and Total shows.’

Johnson’s sentiments are echoed, to a large degree, by Keith Simpson, marketing manager of Spiroflow. Spiroflow‘s principal products are conveyors for dry bulk solids such as granules and powders but the company has also moved into the production of filling and emptying systems for FIBCs — flexible intermediate bulk containers — more commonly referred to as Bulk or Big Bags.

Simpson is also clear that he sees a definite convergence between the processing and packaging disciplines in many companies.

‘In our own business we started off as the link between the process and the packaging lines, conveying material from one to the other,’ he says.

‘Now, we have evolved into a supplier both of the conveying and the packaging — Big Bag — system. I see the same thing happening within our customer base. It is now quite common to deal with one executive who has the responsibility for both processing and packaging rather than two, which would have been the case before.‘

'We are definitely reflecting these changes in our approach to marketing where we now tend to promote ourselves through both the process and packaging media, as well as those dealing with bulk handling as a separate topic. In this sense, the way in which the PPMA shows and the Total exhibition are starting to target this audience makes perfect sense and I think it is something that should have even more emphasis in future shows.’

Another company that comfortably straddles both sectors is Swiss group Romaco, which describes itself as a global supplier of process and packaging lines for the pharmaceutical, cosmetics and food industries.

Given this profile, it would seem inevitable for Romaco to see obvious synergies between the two disciplines. However, although they emphasise the need for convergence, they are less certain about the rate at which it is happening compared to the other companies we spoke to.

Indeed Romaco’s spokesperson, Rosemary Alton, says: ‘As a manufacturer that can do everything from processing to packaging, we would obviously prefer to deal with people with a more comprehensive knowledge of both disciplines. However, we still find the knowledge requirement between processing and packaging people a long way apart. Yes, we see a centralised approach once you get higher up in the bigger companies. But, at project level, we find that we still have to deal with separate packaging and processing functions and, on the process side, we are dealing with people with chemical engineering skills of a much higher order.’

Alton acknowledges that, once past the project stage, there is a tendency for larger companies to use central buying functions.

‘Once they take over, then the approach becomes much more focused on the project as a whole rather than the different elements of processing and packaging. This is particularly true since the trend towards "lean purchasing" gathered pace.’

Romaco will be at this year’s PPMA event as it has been since 1991. In common with the other exhibitors, Alton welcomes the increasing effort to bring processing and packaging closer together at the PPMA and 2007’s Total exhibition, saying it reflects a trend also seen at other major exhibitions around the world.