Case Study

Towards better cloud - Implementation of our Partner, Antdata, for Upfield

Factories of the future are no longer just snaps from sci-fi movies. The described project is a proof. Today’s IoT technology in manufacturing allows for significant process automation, even in distributed production plants and factories.

Customer pain points

Upfield is already taking advantage of the possibility of “intelligent” production processes. This global manufacturing company was struggling with problems typical of this vertical, which reduced its profits and disrupted the efficiency of its production processes.

The company did not have full real-time visibility of factory operations. Plants operating on as many as 5 continents needed to improve the flow of information in the company. This mainly concerned the efficiency of production lines (OEE) in all factories. There was also a need to centralize data and analyze it in-depth. After all, working with data and analyzing it is the daily bread of each of the company’s production departments. Measurements, controls and quality assessment without real-time analysis are not only unreliable, but above all they affect the work and results of the entire enterprise and its profitability.

The solution to all these problems was the implementation of Microsoft IoT, which was carried out by Antdata.

Why IoT?

Microsoft IoT technology is the automation, synchronization and implementation of processes such as DevOps in order to:

  • Identify bottlenecks that reduce efficiency, allowing you to improve processes
  • Reduce downtime caused by unscheduled maintenance or equipment failure
  • Eliminate materials, parts or non-standard errors

Project implementation

A data flow architecture was used to improve production processes and data management between factories.

Step 1

Connection and integration of multiple data sources was performed

Step 2

Data has been uploaded to the cloud in Azure.

Step 3

The target system was created based on the combination and integration of multiple services

Client’s references

It's the most flexible tool I've seen so far. This is a model example of implementing the idea of industry 4.0 - digitization of processes and reporting in real time.
Jonathan Almeida
Process Engineer, Upfield

Partner's opinion

The project turned out to be groundbreaking on many levels. From the significant impact on the business, through our ability to attract and retain talent, to the source of great satisfaction.
Maciej Karpiński
Board Member, Antdata

The aim of APN Promise is to present the solution implemented by our Partner Antdata for Upfield to a wider audience, also from outside the production sector, and to show the benefits of implementation.

Benefits of Antdata implementing
Azure cloud services (IoT)

  • access to data and the possibility of advanced analytics, both for current needs and in historical and predictive terms
  • analysis and reporting for each production line and separate products
  • detailed analysis and monitoring of performance trends
  • faster and accurate detection of the causes of problems
  • creating comparative reports
  • possibility of simultaneous implementation in several factories

Azure cloud technologies
that were used

  • Data Factory – for extraction, transformation and data load from multiple sources
  • Power Apps – for an intuitive interface
  • Stream Analytics – for real-time streaming data processing
  • Power BI – for simple data visualization

Antdata

An international IT company, with branches in Great Britain and Poland. It serves both local entities and corporations – members of the FTSE 100 index. Thanks to this, the company has gained a unique perspective and increased its competitiveness. Antdata is a guarantee of the highest quality of services with the purchase of a Microsoft license (Power BI, Power Apps, Azure, Office 365).

Upfield

The world’s largest producer of plant-based food. As a global plant-based manufacturer, we offer consumers around the world a range of over 100 well-known brands. Upfield sells products in over 95 countries and has 17 manufacturing plants around the world.

Promise Group

One of Microsoft’s largest partners. In addition to licensing services, the company specializes in four areas: cloud services, data analytics, cybersecurity and a modern work environment. We specialize in Azure technology for independent software vendors (ISVs).