Efficiency, taste, and sustainability are paramount in food manufacturing, particularly when producing soups and sauces. Traditional methods often fall short, being labor-intensive and energy-consuming. Discover how Steam Infusion can redefine your production metrics—reach out to the OAL team today.

Our focus in this blog is to challenge the myths preventing the adoption of robotic automation in powder weighing and handling. Fear of the unknown and failure often deter progress, but by confronting these misconceptions, we can ease the path towards inevitable automation across various industries.

Celebrate OAL's 30th anniversary by getting to know our founder, Harry Norman. A visionary who fell in love with robotics, Harry saw its potential in the food and beverage industry and founded OAL at just 28. His knack for innovation led to groundbreaking solutions like OAL Connected and Steam Infusion, transforming food manufacturing. Today, Harry's passion for robotics and automation continues to drive OAL's success.

Self-contained pods capable of storing 100+ raw materials, along with a central robot for automatic ingredient selection, weighing, and pouring, have digitalized and modernized the crucial Powder Weighing step in manufacturing. This automation offers key benefits you should be aware of.

Personal care manufacturing has two big problems on its hands: not enough workers and the need for safer working conditions. These issues meet head-on in pre-weigh operations - an area that hasn't seen much digital change yet. 

This key area of production, traditionally reliant on manual labour, has its fair share of safety concerns and efficiency issues. However, there's a clear answer to these challenges: automation. 

The food industry is constantly evolving, and companies that recognise the importance of worker safety and well-being are leading the way. However, protecting workers from the risks of powder exposure has always been a challenging task. Often, traditional solutions to these risks are not practical or cost-effective. Fortunately, with the advent of robotics and automation, a solution is now available.

The use of robotics and automation is gaining immense popularity in the food and beverage industry, with the potential to revolutionise how food is produced, processed, and delivered. Automation systems are playing a pivotal role in reducing the risk of contamination by minimising human intervention and improving product traceability.

With 30 years of experience helping food companies automate, we have identified three key ingredients for success: starting with the end in mind, building internal capability with time to play and test technology, and choosing a software platform over a product.

There are many scare-stories about how the adoption of robots in manufacturing facilities will eliminate the need for people on the factory floor. However, far from operators becoming a distant memory, robotics often creates the opportunity for people to take on more value-adding roles, leaving dull and dangerous tasks to the robots.