Knowledge transfer at Saltigo
Working together to find the best solution

Jack Conen reports:
How do others actually do it? We often asked ourselves this question when we faced challenges in developing or optimizing a recipe. Because even though our products and plants are different, we all face similar tasks: designing efficient production processes, precisely defining parameters, and linking plant functions as effectively as possible. So there is a wealth of expertise in the plants at Saltigo – but until now, no way to share it in a structured manner. Solutions are developed multiple times, even though they already exist elsewhere. That costs time, money – and energy. We wanted to change that!

The idea was therefore to set up a knowledge exchange project for automation engineers. Since Saltigo plants work with different process control systems and therefore also with different programming languages, methods, and structures, it quickly became clear that instead of meeting in a conference room, the meetings had to take place on site in order to develop a real understanding of the other area and the terminology used there. So two plants always got together and organized dates for visits and return visits.

More than just spectators
The focus was on very practical questions from our everyday technical work: How is a Nutsche filter operated or a process step carried out? How do you define the end of a filtration process, for example? The guest automation engineer is given access to the local system and thus gains a deep insight into the workflows. Perhaps the other plant has a more efficient way of carrying out a work step and your own plant could benefit from this. The first meetings have shown that This provides valuable impetus for both sides. We have already identified a number of approaches that could offer added value across locations, but which have so far only been used in one plant.

The aim of future longer exchanges will be for the guest to create a recipe for one of the existing products – according to their own logic and methodology. This will then be compared with the original and discussed together.

The project shows that it is not about finding the perfect system. Each plant has its own strengths and challenges. But if we create transparency and share good ideas, we can achieve so much more together.