Governance
The manufacturing industry is currently undergoing a technological transformation through Industrial Revolution 4.0 (“IR4.0”). This revolution is in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goals (“SDGs”), especially Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure (Goal 9), Responsible Consumption and Production (Goal 12) and Climate Action (Goal 13). IR4.0 is fundamentally changing the way products are designed and produced, as well as the operations, processes, supply chain management and energy footprint of factories. The revolution is driven by a range of advanced technologies, including artificial intelligence (“AI”), big data analytics, augmented reality, additive manufacturing, system integration, autonomous robots, cybersecurity, simulation, advanced materials, the Internet of Things (“IoT”) and cloud computing.
ViTrox strives to identify gaps, create solutions for our customers and bring positive contributions that genuinely matter to society and humankind. Ultimately, our goal in technology and innovation is to reduce the global electronic waste generated from manufacturing processes.
Among the IR4.0 advanced technologies, ViTrox’s manufacturing intelligence suite, V-ONE, focuses on industrial IoT, data analytics and AI to help manufacturing companies achieve digital transformation and prepare their businesses for IR4.0. To provide a more tangible and comprehensive solution, V-ONE also works with ecosystem partners to enable system integration, cloud computing, manufacturing execution system (“MES”), manufacturing operations management (“MOM”), quality management system (“QMS”) and enterprise resource planning (“ERP”).
Providing Sustainable Approaches to Factories
Many common issues faced by manufacturing companies are correlated to a lack of data visibility. V-ONE targets to tackle these challenges, such as loss of hidden operational costs and frequent production downtime, by helping customers identify and address bottlenecks.
Factories often operate below their optimum level because they don't identify problems early enough to fix them easily, or because they spend too much time and money on manual tasks. Even today, many factory workers perform routine jobs manually, such as recording periodic data and printing job orders, which takes time away from more valuable tasks. Digitisation and digitalisation of V-ONE solution can analyse vast amounts of production data to identify areas for improvement, such as reducing energy consumption or streamlining material usage.
V-ONE AIoT on the cloud is a plug-and-play solution that saves businesses time and money on developing their own hardware and software solutions. It is easily adaptable to changing business needs, and customers can customise the standard template to meet their specific requirements, which facilitates the implementation of sustainable practices that are aligned with their environmental goals.
In short, V-ONE simplifies IoT deployment for factories, helping them achieve digital transformation and adopt smart manufacturing processes. Besides improving production efficiency and output, the solution helps reduce resource footprints from the production process and minimise waste because the operators can solve the problem before it harms or damages the other product or wastes more materials and resources. By ensuring better operational efficiency, fewer defective products are manufactured, leading to a decrease in electronic waste. Moreover, enabling better decision-making helps companies avoid overproduction or production of faulty items that might end up as waste.
The implementation of digitalisation with this smart solution follows a few key stages. First, the data is surfaced to enable visibility across the production line. This gives an immediate overview of the production process through traceability. After at least one month of data collection, the data is visualised to provide insights into machine utilisation, production capacity, output quality, etc. These insights can then be used for resource planning and allocation, which minimises the resource wastage of companies. Eventually, reduced material waste and more efficient energy usage contribute directly to sustainable manufacturing practices.
In the long term, with sufficient data, more advanced decision-making becomes possible. V-ONE machine learning can be deployed to enable preventive and predictive analytics on maintenance plans across the production line to avoid unforeseen issues and downtime. This not only improves overall efficiency but also reduces the need for emergency repairs or replacements, thereby decreasing resource consumption and waste.
Through its ability to provide data insights and recommend maintenance needs, V-ONE contributes to better product lifecycle management. It extends the life of machinery and equipment, reducing the frequency of replacements and, consequently, the environmental impact associated with manufacturing new equipment.
Helping Customers Achieve Digital Transformation
One of the V-ONE solution’s notable successes was assisting a customer in converting their retrofit painting operation line into a fully digital painting 4.0 control line. Prior to V-ONE solution’s implementation, the operators manually monitored indicators like water and pH levels, recording them hourly on paper. This outdated process resulted in failed output whenever operators were absent for monitoring. Additionally, the manual operation required operators to manually set the oven temperature control whenever an engineering change order (“ECO”) was issued.
To address these challenges, the painting line was outfitted with IoT sensors in the first stage, enabling data collection and shifting the operation away from its heavy reliance on manual monitoring. Subsequently, the system processed the collected data with machine learning and quality standard ratios to generate comprehensive analyses presented in dashboards. The table below shows how V-ONE innovative features address the customer’s challenges and lead them to success.
Challenges Identified | Innovative Feature | Customer Success | |
The entire painting line did not have any system traceability and automation features. The pretreatment chemical tank required manual measurement without any datalog. The curing process required manual setting on oven temperature control without any datalog. |
Automatically collect machine data through direct connection, edge devices or sensors to achieve machine-to-machine connectivity |
Achieved smart automation traceability by improving connectivity across the painting line through the deployment of IoT-enabled sensors and edge devices and system integration. Enabled automatic capture datalog of water and pH levels and alkaline/phosphate conductivity with the sensor installation. Upgraded the existing painting line control panel with temperature control functionality to enable smart temperature reading capture and automatic set-point value adjustment based on job order parameters scanned at the kiosk system. |
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Provide meaningful insights to users on a real-time basis through a fully flexible digital analytics dashboard with drill-down charts | Obtained immediate access to accurate sensory data and statistical analysis, including machine utilisation, overall equipment efficiency, and daily job orders, on a real-time basis in a user-friendly dashboard view. | ||
Notify users of potential problems before occurrences through an alert system empowered with deep learning and AI processing technologies to avoid downtime and lost production | Enabled the autonomous alert-triggering system with auto-ticketing issuance for equipment status monitoring, predictive and preventive maintenance and abnormal machine activities. |
Customer Testimonial
Innovating Smart Solutions for a Sustainable Future
Like most business organisations, innovation is one of the most important aspects as we strive to achieve our goals and objectives. Different types of innovations will directly affect the company’s product or process. At ViTrox, we innovate to convert traditional systems into new and improved methods, upgrading business operation systems and launching Industry 4.0 technologies.
As enterprises endeavour to achieve higher productivity through better quality control, ViTrox is also looking for ways to reduce unplanned downtime. As an experienced machine manufacturer, we know that piecemeal technology investment will no longer be enough for manufacturers to flourish in Industry 4.0. Therefore, the interconnected machine network with a real-time monitoring system is the key to sustainable success.
With Industry 4.0 foreseeing a greater reliance on machine learning, machine vision technology plays an essential role in capturing the environment and converting it into networked digital data.
V-ONE® Smart Solution
As an Industry 4.0 Smart Solution, V-ONE® caters to providing insightful analytics to users on a real-time basis with many innovative features, including big data, data analytics, status monitoring, an alert plan feature, ticketing for maintenance purposes and a fully configurable dashboard. Big data is complex and only useful if it can be acquired, stored, and processed quickly and economically. As a result of improved data use, the ability to gather deep knowledge about manufacturing processes and the accessibility of real-time data, prescriptive and predictive analytics are now possible at many levels of production facilities.
We believe that V-ONE® can help users to proceed towards digital transformation and prepare their businesses for Industry 4.0.
Smart Agriculture Solutions
The drive for sustainability begins from the operations of our Company. We aim to create a culture of compassionate innovation at ViTrox. We develop technologies and solutions with empathy, focusing on improving the well-being of individuals and society as a whole. With that in mind, we think of ways to reduce electronic waste and increase production efficiency. We have been introducing environmentally friendly and socially responsible products, which reflects our ESG goal to have at least two (2) NPIs per year. Through significant investments in agricultural technologies, we strive to improve food security for our nation, ultimately uplifting the living standards for all. We have been cultivating a culture of consuming earth-friendly meals, which benefits our planet, but also promotes a healthier and more sustainable way of life.
Besides facilitating the adaptation of manufacturing processes to Industry 4.0, we also design smart agriculture solutions to mitigate pressing challenges such as high foreign labour dependencies and unreliable yields impacted by unpredictable weather conditions in our country.
ViTrox Agritech Sdn. Bhd. (“VAG”) aims to deliver solutions to increase farming yields while reducing labour costs, minimise the harm of pesticides on humans and reduce water consumption in agricultural processes.
In 2022, we carried out research and development (“R&D”) on four (4) products and solutions: Spiral Integrated Planting System (“SIPS”) machine, V-Gutter growing system, V-Seeder machine and V-ONE® with AIoT Cloud.
The machine could speed up the process of transplanting and simplify post-harvest planting bed preparation by allowing effective plant residue removal.
The system allows the planting of vegetables in multi-tiered systems in an easier manner.
The machine greatly reduces the sowing time and the labour required during the seeding process.
The solution combines farm management software and Internet of Things (“IoT”) devices to provide farmers with actionable information on factors such as the real-time monitoring conditions of crops, soil and weather.
As ViTrox adopts Industry 4.0 technologies, our Company could expect a higher increase in productivity and competitiveness in the future. We believe that the combination of innovation and automation can help businesses reach exponential growth.