Co-Innovation: Sarna Plastec & Modum

Sarna Plastec is the leading expert for innovative plastic foils and foams, and is highly specialized in pharma, medtech, and food packaging and insulation solutions. The Swiss company closely collaborates with their customers to develop customized insulation boxes, load carriers or any other reusable (or disposable) packaging solutions.

MODsense for assessment of new box insulation materials

One of the services Sarna Plastec offers to their customers, is to design foam-based insulation inlays for trays used to transport medicinal products or food. They approached Modum last year with a challenge they were facing - speeding up the development process by having a flexible and validated measurement system that is not only easy to use and to set up, but which also gives them data based insights into temperature testing the foams. And thus, being able to validate the initial concept at an early stage of the development.

Specifically, the developers wanted to know whether the insulation foams could maintain the temperature they were designed to hold. By using the MODsense solution, they were able to measure and qualify the insulation performance of the foams on the one hand, and to easily manage and document the experiments on the other.

sarnaplastec_production_0

In one of the experiments, for example, a MODsense data logger activated via smart phone and placed inside the packaging to be assessed, the whole thing then goes into a temperature-controlled oven to test different temperature profiles. The MODsense T logger continuously records the temperature inside the package, making the verification of the performance of the insulation foams very effortless. The collected data from the logger is directly transferred to the intuitive web application, and linked to the experiment number, making the data readily available – without having to go through myriads of PDF documents.

190603_Summertest

This approach is particularly suitable for the initial product development phase, because it allows quick and easy access to condition data, allowing concepts to be validated before large-scale production.

Jörg Freitag, Head of Research & Development at Sarna Plastec is enthusiastic about the collaboration and says

“Thanks to MODsense, we are finally able to monitor our product development in the way we have always wanted to. We can now analyze the further development of our products perfectly and plan the next steps. MODsense has opened new development paths for us.”

MODsense is now also utilized to verify the calibration of the foam drying and stabilisation ovens Sarna Plastec uses in their production and temperature test processes. Installing MODsense T data loggers in these ovens was straightforward and allows to periodically verify that set temperature profiles in the ovens are accurate. In addition, it also allows to control the effect of opening the oven door on temperature constancy – comparable to Modum's Room Mapping offering that let you simplify and automate temperature mapping studies and thus to drastically reduce time and cost of temperature measurement and report compilation.

“We enjoy working with Sarna Plastec as an innovative and agile partner, they have a similar mindset in bringing new value propositions to market quickly and their application of MODsense is a straightforward and great way to learn from their feedback and to continue to improve our solution”, Simon Dössegger, Modum’s CEO commented on the cooperation.

MODsense enables you to track and monitor internal quality assurance, development and logistics processes, by adding our MODsense data loggers to your products or equipment you can get automatic updates along the value chain!

If you have similar challenges involving lack of transparency regarding internal processes or validity of equipment, please reach out to us.

 

About Sarna Plastec
Sarna Plastec is Swiss company with a rich tradition and over 50 years of experience. The company aims to be the partner customers can rely on for foam and foil technologies. The customized products, including styrofoam packaging and synthetic construction components, as well as fillable elements such as air cushions, are manufactured in accordance with strict quality criteria suited to the customers’ requirements.

https://www.sarna-plastec.ch/en