Bringing Nestlé's ready-to-drink coffee line to life in Japan, virtually

GEA has worked with Nestlé to introduce a production line for ready-to-drink coffee products in Shimada, Japan. The company was expanding its production capacity in the Asian region and it contracted GEA, having worked with the company extensively in the past, to get the equipment up and running.

This was complicated by the nature of the COVID-19 pandemic: Japan’s borders were shut to foreigners and non-citizens, meaning that GEA personnel outside of Japan were unable to directly assist in the production line’s operation.

This meant that the commissioning phase, often the most critical phase in developing a new production facility, was done remotely, which opened up new, more sustainable ways of collaboration between globally dispersed project teams.

Much of the equipment was assembled outside of the country and shipped in to be easily installed, such as the ultra-high-temperature treatment system being shipped in from Germany in a single assembled piece that had been extensively factory tested to allow it to come quickly online.

Remote commissioning experts in Germany, Singapore and Pakistan were able to keep things running smoothly thanks to the use of digital control rooms and remote service desks. These allowed for the production line to be efficiently and sustainably operated despite the difficulties of remote networking.

Image caption: Start of production in Nestlé’s Shimada Factory supplied by GEA. Image copyright: Nestlé