CSi palletising reduces its CO² footprint through remote service with IXON Cloud

CSi palletising supplies fully integrated material handling and palletising systems for the fast moving consumer goods industry. From single robot palletiser cells to the fastest multi load & line palletisers. Remote access via IXON Cloud helps reduce downtime and their carbon footprint, improving response times and customer satisfaction. CSi has created a video about their remote service capabilities that combine different technologies to meet customer needs.

CSi's after sales team includes a 24/7 support desk that uses various access methods to support their customers worldwide. “We are an international company and our customers usually produce day and night,” says Frans Mertens, Manager Middleware Software Solutions at CSi. “The faster we can remotely connect an on-duty engineer to the system, the better. We really wanted to improve our service level.”

Initially, CSi was unable to connect directly to their installations. If the support desk wanted to gain remote access, they had to ask their customer for access to their jump server. This slowed down response times, and therefore the service CSi provided.

Moreover, jump servers bring safety risks and are no longer suitable for secure user access. IXON Cloud solved this problem with them security measures and a advanced user management system.

Solution

CSi supplies the IXrouter now standard in all their i-Pal products to take advantage of the benefits the solution offers them. CSi can connect their maintenance engineers directly to the machines via the IXrouter. They collect data on the built-in server and can connect an industrial IP camera so that they can monitor remotely to shorten the mean time between repairs (MTBR).

Some customers choose to turn on VPN only when necessary, others are always connected. VPN access is easy for CSi customers to arrange with a physical switch.

In the video below, CSi shows how they provide remote service with IXON Cloud. In the video CSi shows them remote service options and how they ensure that their installations are back up and running more quickly in the event of a failure:

Frans describes: “In the video our customer has a problem with one of our standard robot solutions, the i-Pal. The customer is relatively inexperienced with the robot and calls our 24/7 helpdesk. The support engineer asks the customer to turn on the VPN connection so that he can access the robot on location. The customer then enables the VPN with a physical switch, allowing the engineer to access the machine remotely. He looks at the robot's teach pendant, sees the robot's program and determines the cause.”

The customer can also connect the IP camera to a cabinet socket and physically disconnect the IXrouter from the network. “This example shows that the combination of IXON and CSi can reduce machine downtime in the factory,” says Frans.

Result

“Our remote service offering is growing. Our engineer can support multiple customers around the world on the same day, because it can all be done remotely. This reduces both travel costs and our CO2 footprint,” says Frans. This fits in well with one of CSi's core values, which is also very important to their customers: sustainability.

Response time and downtime are also reduced, which increases customer satisfaction. In addition, CSi has unrestricted access to the machine software. “Unlike before, we can now take over the teach pendant and add camera images, because we can set up a VPN connection. This allows us to look deeply into the robot's programming and therefore analyze it more precisely.”

Frans adds: “We are also very enthusiastic about the data logging- and alarm possibilities and are in contact with our customers about this. This would allow us to integrate information into customer dashboards. Furthermore, it can be combined with CSi's Middleware Software Suite called More.”