AkzoNobel monitors IoT data via Production Performance Portal

AkzoNobel has switched to a cloud platform for continuous monitoring of its production, which, partly thanks to IoT technology, reduces production downtime. During the PPA event will Evert Nooijen and Hans Bos from AkzoNobel and Microsoft respectively give insight to in the development and implementation of the so-called Production Performance Portal that runs on the Azure cloud platform.

By: Dimitri Reijerman

Evert Nooijen is an enterprise architect at AkzoNobel and, together with his colleagues, defines the group's longer-term IT landscape. In November, the Production Performance Portal went live in various AkzoNobel factories. He says: “The performance portal has been implemented on four completely different production lines. This was done deliberately because we hoped to be able to cover the most important production processes of AkzoNobel Paints and Coatings. It is currently used at, among others, the powder coatings factory in Como, Italy, containing mills and extruders, a number of resin reactors in Barcelona, an inline disperser in Ghangzhou and a filling line for filling cans and pots of paint at high speed. in Maua, Brazil.”

Nooijen sees several advantages in running the Production Performance Portal on Azure cloud technology: “The advantage of the cloud is that we can scale up faster and add new machines and factories from the central management portal in Azure. If everything is centrally located in the cloud, we do not have to implement software locally. The complete solution is central and can be managed centrally.”

He continues: “Before we started the implementation, we wanted to implement an MES system locally at every production site. The IoT platforms turned out to be more flexible and scalable and therefore cheaper than the local MES systems. Another advantage is that because everything is centrally located in the cloud, we can easily compare different production sites around the world. Furthermore, the developments of IoT solutions are moving extremely quickly, and the suppliers of the IoT platforms continue to make continuous improvements. The new features are available immediately without the need for any software upgrades.”

Edge server

An edge server is still required to implement the system in AkzoNobel's various production facilities. Nooijen: “The architecture is hybrid with the central solution and data in the cloud (possibly spread across different data centers around the world), and a local edge server on the production site. This edge server aggregates data before it is moved to Azure, so that less data is stored on Azure in the cloud and overall costs remain lower. Furthermore, the edge server can perform certain functions locally and possibly work autonomously if a production site may lose connection to the internet.”

AkzoNobel is also considering applying the Production Performance Portal platform in other production chains: “The intention is certainly to apply the solution in multiple production processes and to implement even more IoT applications. For example, a parallel project has been started to collect quality data collected during the production process on the IoT platform for dashboards and real-time analyses, so that the production process can be adjusted during production if necessary.”

“Another example of an expansion is the paint mixing machines at DIY stores. These machines are often owned by AkzoNobel and are also maintained by us. The IoT platform allows status data to be collected on Azure and predictive maintenance can be predicted using machine learning,” Nooijen concludes.

Would you like to learn more about AkzoNobel's Production Performance Portal on Microsoft's Azure cloud platform? Register for free for the PPA event on January 29.