Touching the lives of millions of South Africans over the last century, Tiger Brands produces many of the country’s most-loved consumer brands including Oros, Energade, Hall’s, Fatti’s and Moni’s, Jungle Oats, All Gold and Tastic Rice. As the organisation embarks on a digitalisation drive, its manufacturing plants require a technology management solution overhaul.
Taking a phased approach to the project, the first Tiger Brands plant selected was its beverages manufacturing facility in Germiston. The immediate challenges were linked to the stability of a legacy control system and the communication network in place. Additionally, the existing control and automation platform had limited capabilities when it came to batching, reporting and the tracking and tracing of materials.
Plant upgrade
The project involved upgrading the legacy plant control system with the implementation of a combined Siemens WINCC scada and PM-addons, along with the associated network and control equipment that included communication converters, PLCs, VSDs and ASI modules for various process areas. As the chosen system integrator, Control System Integration (CSI) worked with Tiger Brands to execute the project. CSI has extensive engineering experience, including food and beverage industry expertise. Additionally, CSI applies industry best practices and professional governance models that are implemented to achieve project excellence. The close collaboration between Tiger Brands, CSI and Siemens ultimately provided a roadmap to a successful outcome.
Tiger Brands also uses Siemens Totally Integrated Automation Portal (TIA) as it offers the organisation a unified engineering platform and diagnostics for all the associated devices on site. Additionally, the WINCC scada and PM-addons provide enhanced visualisations and product traceability across the entire production line. It also delivers consistent and specific batching to deliver more accurate throughput and quality. Tiger Brands can now adjust recipes in a more robust manner according to the final specified product in the new environment. This is something not possible with the previous control system. Furthermore, the Siemens solution presents Tiger Brands with a manageable OPEX pricing framework for a long-term approach when it comes to migrating Tiger Brands onto the Siemens digitalisation framework.
Partnership approach
According to Shailen Toolsi, lead process engineer at Tiger Brands, “One of the reasons for this successful project is the collaboration between CSI, Siemens and Tiger Brands, which brings about efficient technical and sales support. We see a long-term partnership with Siemens going forward.”
“We are extremely proud to be building on this partnership with Tiger Brands to demonstrate our expertise through the digital portfolio,” adds Claudio Ranaudo, senior vice president, Digital Industries, Siemens Southern & Eastern Africa. “The future of the food and beverage industry requires production that is tailored to customer demands. Our solutions provide flexibility and higher productivity and with customisation at various sites, have the capability to customise our offering for the specific case as well as the entire industry. We look forward to working with Tiger Brands to further develop solutions that will enable a gateway for digitalisation roadmaps.”
Tiger Brands has seen value in the Siemens control system and is currently implementing the same system across another site.
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