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42 Technology (42T) has joined forces with industry leaders in machine vision, edge AI silicon and software – Balluff, Synaptics, and Arcturus Networks – to help develop and demonstrate a breakthrough approach for AI-powered automated line clearance in pharmaceutical manufacturing.
The four partners have pooled their technology expertise and application knowledge to develop a lower cost, flexible, and scalable alternative to existing AI-powered automated technologies. Most dedicated systems designed to automate line clearance processes are too expensive for widespread use because of their high hardware costs, complex integration, and the need for extensive training on production lines.
The new approach, which has been developed with inputs from some of the world’s leading pharmaceutical manufacturers, addresses these challenges by using a fully autonomous, deep-learning AI platform. Unlike conventional systems, the inspection system is designed to enable in-process learning without the need for lengthy setup and training routines on live production lines.
Line clearance checks are critical in pharmaceutical manufacturing to ensure that all materials, products, labels and records from a previous batch have been completely removed before starting the next one. The process involves multiple manual inspections, often taking up to one hour between batches, which significantly impacts production efficiency, especially as the industry shifts towards personalized medicine and smaller batch sizes. Industry experts estimate up to 85% time savings with automated line clearance versus current manual checks.
42 Technology has designed and built a technology demonstrator unit, shown above, that will feature at several major industry and customer events this year.42 Technology
A key limitation of existing automated solutions is the need for extensive on-site training of their machine learning models at multiple points on live production lines. This new AI-powered platform eliminates that requirement by using deep learning as a stand-alone method for continuous model improvement. This creates a fully-automatic process where datasets are continuously developed in real time.
This image, which was taken in 42 Technology’s development labs, shows the system’s deep-learning software monitoring a range of example products and differentiating by color. The system not only identifies objects but also distinguishes between them, detecting anomalies or defects and triggering alerts when necessary.24 Technology
David Sandner, Product Marketing Manager for Machine Vision at Balluff said, “With some pharmaceutical manufacturers operating up to 100 production lines with 20 or more cameras on each, cost and complexity have been major barriers to automating line clearance. Balluff is developing image acquisition and processing platforms to help customers and partners address these challenges in more cost-efficient ways. These solutions promise a real breakthrough in helping manufacturers to boost production efficiencies, save costs and increase security.”
The new AI-powered approach combines Balluff’s high-performance image acquisition system, as shown above, with deep-learning models and the Synaptics Astra SL1680 edge AI processor.42 Technology
42 Technology has built a technology demonstrator, shown here in the company’s development labs, to showcase this new AI-driven approach for automated line clearance. The unit will be launched at this year’s Embedded World event.42 Technology
