LACROIX

At LACROIX plants, the “Smart Industry” development plan is geared towards pragmatic objectives: industrial and energy performance.

Based on the accumulation of data in real-time and the automation of repetitive tasks with no added value, the performance aspect of the Smart Industry is reflected in specific projects.

Real-Time Monitoring, a fount of learning for artificial intelligence

Real-Time Monitoring contributes to industrial performance improvements at our plants by identifying deviations in production performance.

Connection of production equipment with an integrated information system often involves use of multiple programming languages and collection of significant amounts of data. The Electronics activity of LACROIX is working to simplify this complexity utilizing the Thingworx® IoT platform. Organizing data efficiently enables automated generation of alerts and production reports.

How can we further harness the power of this immense quantity of information?

Capturing the ability to capture all this production data is an essential step that comes before the final phase – allowing the machines to correct themselves through artificial intelligence. By analyzing the “Machine Learning” and “Deep Learning” solutions available on the market, the Electronics activity of LACROIX is opening the door to a world brimming with potential.

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Automate to achieve excellence

Component placing operations have already been heavily automated for years thanks to “Surface Mount Technology” production lines. The production steps that follow however are generally manual.

With the goal of improving industrial performance in our factories, our “Smart Industry” team is studying the large-scale automation of the so-called “back-end” production steps. This refers to all production steps to be carried out on the electronic boards coming off the SMT production lines. Currently, “back-end” production tasks are primarily carried out by operators, including certain repetitive tasks that have little added value.

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Automation of repetitive actions such as loading or unloading boards from racks, mechanical attachment, and bonding is under study at our factories by means of:

  • Robots set up in closed environments to optimize the speed and productivity of the function.
  • Experimentation with cobots also known as collaborative robots, a solution that is automated, flexible, and adaptable for several different types of tasks on the same day.

Back to our Smart Industry strategy