PepsiCo
Canvas Category OEM : Beverage
PepsiCo products are enjoyed by consumers more than one billion times a day in more than 200 countries and territories around the world. PepsiCo generated $79 billion in net revenue in 2021, driven by a complementary beverage and convenient foods portfolio that includes Lay’s, Doritos, Cheetos, Gatorade, Pepsi-Cola, Mountain Dew, Quaker, and SodaStream. PepsiCo’s product portfolio includes a wide range of enjoyable foods and beverages, including many iconic brands that generate more than $1 billion each in estimated annual retail sales.
Assembly Line
PepsiCo installs its first automated warehouse in Poland with Mecalux
PepsiCo, a global leader in food and beverages, has installed its first automated warehouse in Poland, its most sustainable in Europe. Automation facilitates production with the push system, which involves manufacturing in advance to meet anticipated demand.
The facility was designed in line with the push system, which involves manufacturing in advance to meet anticipated demand. While this method reduces unit costs, it requires sufficient space to manage large production runs. With 9,000 locations, PepsiCo’s new finished goods warehouse receives a large number of pallets daily, loaded with ready-to-ship bags of potato crisps for clients. “The production process is fully integrated with the automated warehouse. Each potato crisp bag is transported from the manufacturing area to final packaging, ready to be picked and loaded onto the lorry,” says Pietrusa.
Transporting goods internally between storage and production is now faster thanks to electric monorail and conveyor systems for pallets. These solutions also connect the warehouse with the docking area, facilitating the shipment of thousands of pallets a day. The electric monorail deposits pallets ordered by clients into five double-channel live roller conveyor lines. Each channel has a 34-pallet capacity. SKUs are grouped according to delivery route, vehicle type, client and shipping priority, among other factors.
How factories are deploying AI on production lines
Augury’s sensors used in PepsiCo factories have been trained on huge volumes of audio data, to be able to detect faults such as wearing on conveyor belts and bearings, while analysing machine vibrations. By also collecting information and insights into equipment health on the whole, such as identifying when a machine might fail again in future, the technology lets workers schedule maintenance in advance, and avoid having to react to machine errors as they occur.
Prof Brintrup, professor of digital manufacturing at the University of Cambridge’s Institute for Manufacturing, leads the Institute for Manufacturing’s Supply Chain AI Lab, which has developed its own predictive mechanism to identify where ingredients such as palm oil may have been used in a product, but disguised under a different name on its label. The lab’s recent research suggested that palm oil can go by 200 different names in the US - and these might not stand out to eco-conscious consumers.
3D printing hits the spot: How PepsiCo is using AM to produce drink bottle tooling
Among those tools and capabilities is PepsiCo’s patented Modular Mold Set, which is compatible with most standard blow moulders and comprises an aluminium shell, dental stone, and 3D printed inserts for various bottle designs from 100ml to 3L. “The Modular Mold Set is a means for us to be able to very rapidly and quickly generate a customised mould that we can then utilise in our lab-scale or Pilot Plant scale stretch blow moulding equipment,” Rodriguez told TCT.
Previously, to get functional mould samples, PepsiCo would contract an external service provider who would leverage a subtractive manufacturing technique – CNC or EDM, depending on the complexity – and return the tool within two-to-four weeks at a typical cost of up to 10,000 USD.