MVC Announces the Acquisition of Bentley Automation

Machine Vision Consulting (MVC) is excited to announce the acquisition of Bentley Automation effective November 15, 2011.  Bentley Automation, based in Cumberland, Rhode Island,  provides expertise in all aspects of factory automation focusing mainly on PLC communications, Factory Talk, mechanical design, and machine building.  This acquisition allows MVC to provide a full array of factory automation and machine vision services for our customers.

In addition, Mr. David Bentley has joined the MVC staff as Director of Operations.  Mr. Bentley has a proven track record for successful on-time deliveries.

Machine Vision Consulting Featured on Business Day with Terry Bradshaw

Machine Vision Consulting (MVC) is excited to announce our upcoming national TV segment Business Day with Terry Bradshaw to be aired on the Fox Business Network. In this feature, Terry Bradshaw showcases how MVC’s CodeSure®, SureLabel™ , and CircumSpect® products are making a difference in Food & Drug Packaging Safety.

Our TV segment includes videos of CodeSure and SureLabel in action at Knouse Foods in Pennsylvania. It also includes exclusive interviews with Jeff Dannay and Phil Gouin (MVC’s Co-founders), Bryan Boatner (Sales Manager) from Cognex and Rob Woerner, Assistant Director of Engineering at Knouse Foods.

Tune in this Saturday, August 6th for the national broadcasting of this TV segment: 4pm Eastern/3pm Central/2pm Mountain and 1pm Pacific Time on Fox Business Network.

MVC's SureLabel Selected as MITX Innovation Awards Finalist

Machine Vision Consulting is excited to announce that our SureLabel™ product has been selected as a finalist for the MITX Innovation Awards. Held annually by the Massachusetts Innovation & Technology Exchange, the MITX Innovation Awards celebrates the innovations powering the future of marketing and revolutionizing the way we work and play.

“This year’s finalists blew us away with their creativity, ingenuity and passion for innovation. They are truly reflective of the many exciting things that are driving our industry right now,” said MITX president, Debi Kleiman. “We’re proud to showcase the region’s top innovations through this Awards program – giving these innovators a place to shout loud and proud about what they’ve achieved.”

SureLabel™ is a powerful and flexible label inspection system that verifies pre-printed labels on oriented flat, oval shaped and sqround shaped (square – round) commercial containers. This fully integrated hardware/software turnkey system ensures perfect match between lid, container, labels and contents, thus preserving brand image and ensuring consumer product safety.

SureLabel works as follows:

• The conveyor carries the product through the camera enclosure for inspection.
• SureLabel analyzes the product images to determine if the product matches the defined recipe.
• A reject station removes containers that fail inspection.

SureLabel has been used to inspect ice cream containers, wine labels, and salad dressing bottles.

“At MVC we are proud to be a finalist for the 2011 MITX awards.  We believe that our SureLabel product is innovative in many ways and is a great solution in support of the recent FDA Food and Modernization Act.  Food manufacturers are now required to ensure that each container of food they produce is properly labeled, providing an additional measure of safety and comfort for consumers.  SureLabel is an excellent addition to our other food safety inspection products, CircumSpect® and CodeSure® which now provide a full suite of products that enable manufacturers to ensure proper container labeling.“ Said Jeff Dannay, President of Machine Vision Consulting.”

Machine Vision Consulting will be recognized with the other finalists in the category of Best Bootstrapped Start-Up at the ceremony traditionally attended by over 350 of the region’s top interactive marketing and technology professionals. Winners will be announced at the ceremony in the Westin Boston Waterfront on Thursday, June 16^th at 6pm.

Read the full press release.

Machine Vision Consulting has developed and deployed 2D code reading solutions that use machine vision technology to automatically read each 2D code presented on a large matrix of coded objects. The point of using machine vision technology to read the 2D codes on individual packages, on individual electronic components, or on other objects in a matrix is to automatically log this data to a client’s manufacturing or packaging control system with no errors.

Carton of 100 Pharmaceutical Boxes, Each Printed With a 2D Data Matrix Code.

In a pharmaceutical case of 100 product boxes, it would be impossible to reliably scan each 2D code manually. There are too many opportunities for errors.

Jedec Tray Containing 70 Electronic Chips, Each Laser-Etched With a 2D Code

For electronics manufacturers, Jedec trays are commonly used for component handling. In the above image, it was critical for the client to track each 2D coded chip through the manufacturing process. The old way of using a hand-held scanner to log each chip led to errors, so MVC’s automated 2D code reading system was implemented.

Speed
It takes 1 second to read all the individual 2D data matrix codes in the examples above and to transmit the data strings over the clients’ networks. In terms of getting the wrong code information, a big benefit of 2D codes is that the 2D codes cannot be read incorrectly. The code is either read correctly or it doesn’t read at all. An unreadable or missing code can be identified for the operator.

Additional information on Machine Vision Consulting, including its standard products and custom solutions, is available on the MVC web site at www.machinevc.com, by e-mailing to sales@machinevc.com, or by contacting Joe Gugliotti at 978-551-4160.

Publix Ice Cream Product Package with Mismatching Lid and Container

In the Publix, example (see image), the artwork on the lid and on the artwork on the container are nearly identical. It is easy to see how a human inspector could miss the difference, and how a consumer could purchase and potentially consume the ice cream without being aware of the allergen issue.

SureLabel ™, when installed on the manufacturing line, uses cameras and machine vision software to validate that lid and the container match. To prevent this problem, the SureLabel system is trained to inspect the only unique feature, the name (flavor) of the ice cream. If there is a mismatch or both are incorrect, the software triggers the reject mechanism to remove the container from the conveyor.

The turnkey SureLabel system, operates at up to 750 units per minute, and validates oval or sqround (square – round) shaped containers.

SureLabel has been successfully implemented on existing ice cream manufacturing lines, and has prevented this type of recall for several other major ice cream manufacturers.

Contact Machine Vision Consulting (978.551.4160) for more information on our SureLabel ™ Product and how SureLabel can prevent recalls by ensuring food safety for your consumers.

¹Recall Notice:

http://www.fda.gov/Safety/Recalls/ucm241477.htm

²FDA, Guidance for Industry: A Food Labeling Guide

http://www.fda.gov/Food/GuidanceComplianceRegulatoryInformation/GuidanceDocuments/FoodLabelingNutrition/FoodLabelingGuide/ucm064880.htm

Suite 210, is MVC’s new home. It is a spacious 2000 square foot loft style office with high, open ceilings, exposed wood beams and brick walls with huge sun filled windows.

An open house is planned for the first week of January, check back for specifics.

Additional photos can be found on our Facebook page.

MVC New Office Building - 69 Milk Street Entrance

Visit Vision Systems Design to read the full article.

Machine Vision Consulting (MVC) introduces a new product offering, SureLabel, that addresses these concerns. It is a powerful and flexible label inspection system that verifies expected pre-printed labels have been properly applied and that the expected pre-printed container has been used. SureLabel is designed for containers that can be oriented on the line. SureLabel provides a unique recipe verification capability that eliminates any confusion among recipes by guaranteeing a unique pairing of recipe to label or pre-printed container.

Main SureLabel Screen (left), Standard SureLabel System (right)

Visit our SureLabel webpage for additional information on SureLabel benefits, components and technical specifications and to view our video of SureLabel in action.

SureLabel’s fully integrated hardware/ software system ensures perfect product presentation.

With a continued eye on expansion, we have established a presence on the west coast with the hiring of Tony Aiello in Portland, OR.  Tony has over 14 years of machine vision industry experience, ranging from applications development with on-site integrations to core software development and management for Cognex’s In-Sight® line of embedded vision systems.  Our goal is to provide customers with local support.
 
With Growth Comes New Buildings

The entire project life cycle is now performed in-house! MVC has opened a 2,000 square foot build facility to accommodate increased project and product construction and test load.  Our build facility, named “Building 2,” is just a short walk from our offices through the center of Westborough.  Here both MVC engineering and fabrication teams work together to ensure our systems are in 100% working order prior to shipment.  In addition to Building 2, MVC acquired the use of a machine shop for fabrication and construction of systems.  With these two “shops” MVC is now able to fully support our customers from initial project conception, fabrication, construction, test and delivery.

MVC Forges New Customer Relationships

MVC has broadened its strength in the food and packaging industry by forging new customer partnerships with Knouse Foods and Allens Canning.  For Knouse, we are installing a CircumSpect® system that provides assurance that the correct label is on all Knouse applesauce jars.  For Allens Canning, we are installing CodeSure® systems on ten lines that verify the correct product code is printed and legible on all can lids.  Our CircumSpect and CodeSure products are the perfect choice for your food and packaging inspection needs.

Machine vision solutions are inherently complex due to the number of variables being addressed in the problem solution (e.g., system speed, image size, number of defects, lighting, complexity of software analysis, etc.). MVC understands that the user interface required to run these highly technical applications needs to be simple, logical and intuitive so that all levels of users can competently run the system to accomplish their job, without having to be trained as an engineer. The fundamental principles of “consistency”, “feedback”, “dual coding” and basic “navigation” of information help create a more intuitive interface especially in the manufacturing environment where machine vision applications are most frequently implemented:

• Consistency – this crosses a number of dimensions from the use of consistent terminology across applications (labeling, reference information), to consistent system behavior in user interactions (e.g., windows and buttons), to the consistent location of functions and displays
• Feedback – all user interactions provide feedback to the user to acknowledge, as a minimum, that an action has taken place (e.g., change in display, color, status, confirmation message).
• Dual Coding – Colored indicators are key to providing critical information on the status of the system. However, color coding is one dimensional – it does not account for changing light conditions, color blindness or other challenges that may be encountered in different environments. For this reason, all statuses are dual coded and key information is also provided with dual information coding. For example, dual coding is the use of color in conjunction with another visual indicator such as a flashing element, a symbol or an icon, a text change such as an underline, or another type of indicator such as sound.
• Navigation – knowing how to navigate an application, is critical to the success of its use. This involves clearly providing information how a user arrived at the current display, what options are available, and how they can return. This information can be provided by using breadcrumbs, adding “selected” states on menu items or tabs, and highlighting a selected option.

These basic principles help a user quickly feel confident on how to navigate the application, find key information, make changes and know that the actions have been successfully completed. These are some of the basic usability principles that MVC incorporates into our all products with the goal of creating a more transparent application interface so that every user (from the line worker to the supervisor) can focus on the task at hand and feel confident in their ability to accomplish it.