Food and beverage breakthrough

Schneider Electric, a specialist in digital transformation, energy management and automation, launched its first Food and Beverage Forum in Coventry in July.

The event invited customers including Müller Wiseman, Warburtons and Arla Foods, and leading IT and OT partners, such as Cisco, NetApps, SoIPT andEbb3, to examine how advancements in technology can drive productivity, efficiency and sustainability.

The forum provided an opportunity to discuss the major challenges and future trends facing the industry, including changing consumer tastes, rising food prices, population growth, digital disruption, energy consumption, emissions and sustainability. During interactive sessions, attendees discussed manufacturing optimisation through automation and augmented reality.

The forum addressed these challenges and trends in the industry, before focussing on two cybersecurity and predictive analysis. The exponential growth of malware is affecting all industries, making end-to-end cybersecurity absolutely essential. Businesses must now cover four areas: access, protection, detection and response. Only by have these capabilities in place, can business mitigate cyberattacks and meet customer expectations. 

Business can maximise reliability in manufacturing through analytics. A major issue for any manufacturer is insuring maximum return from every asset. Analytics is the key to improving maintenance and operations. Looking at historical, real-time, predictive and prescriptive analytics, allowing business to move past traditional practices and develop a strategic, proactive and fully optimised approach.