Cosmopack 2023: Artificial Intelligence comes to the world of beauty product packaging technologies
In 2023 Marchesini Group Beauty will again be exhibiting at Cosmopack (Bologna, 16-18 March), the hub of mechanical technologies for the cosmetics industry, which this year, in synergy with the Cosmoprof show, is forecast to return to pre-pandemic visitor and interaction levels.
For the event, the Group’s beauty division will be fielding some of its latest technologies for processing and packaging cosmetic products developed at its headquarters at Pianoro (Bologna) and the plants of the specialised businesses acquired in the last few years.
All the organisations which now make up the Beauty Division - V2 engineering and Dumek from Emilia, Axomatic, Cosmatic and Rejves Machinery from Lombardy and Vibrotech from Tuscany - will therefore be in attendance at BolognaFiere with their solutions designed to meet the needs of the entire cosmetic product production cycle, from process to end-of-line.
COSMOPACK (16-18 March)
The Marchesini Group Beauty stand A/9PK (hall 19PK) at Cosmopack will display 22 machines: two tube and bottle processing lines, a special area with laboratory machinery and a group of stand-alone machines for the beauty and body care product packaging process.
One major innovation on view on the stand will be a quality control station fitted with software developed by partner SEA Vision and its subsidiary ARGO Vision, companies from Lombardy which specialise in the production of vision and inspection systems and their enhancement with the aid of Artificial Intelligence.
The software, which has been under development for some time, will enable a large number of checks on lipsticks, both standard (e.g. for chipping on the body of the lipstick) and advanced (e.g. inspection to ensure perfect printing of the logo, especially for high-end brands).
“This technology is the outcome of years of research and development in the AI world, with a particular focus on semantic segmentation and generative systems for datasets,” explains Alessandro Ferrari, CEO of ARGO Vision. “By combining conventional vision systems with AI, we make the transition from manual inspection, subject to errors, to extremely high-precision computerised quality control.”
Also on view on the stand will be an Axoblock 100 filling and capping machine, a new, smaller version of the Axomatic Axoblock 160 technology. The strong points of Axoblock 100, designed to process both stable and unstable bottles containing dense, semi-dense and liquid products, include an energy-saving new-generation main drive motor, filling and capping systems driven by servomotors and adjustable directly from the control panel, and provision to connect all devices online, in accordance with Industry 4.0.
OPEN HOUSE (15-16 March)
Partially coinciding with the exhibition, Marchesini Group Beauty will be organising an Open House lasting two days - 15 and 16 March - at the new Beauty Division facilities at the Pianoro Headquarters. Customers will be able to view lines, single machines and laboratory solutions for processing and packaging both mass-market and luxury cosmetic products.
The core technology is a large line for skin care products sold to a foreign CDMO, used for filling and packaging botulin in syringes placed inside paper trays, a special feature which provides the line with an important added benefit in terms of product sustainability. Various Marchesini Group brands contributed to its realisation. The Corima division supplied the two upstream machines - NEXTRA N10 and COMBI 3BS - involved in the syringe manipulation, assembly and labelling procedures. The Tonazzi and Neri divisions provided the technologies which feed the needles on the conveyor belt and those which pack the cartons respectively. Both the on-board robotics and the secondary packaging machines are by Marchesini Group. Finally, SEA Vision supplied the software which checks the product’s presence and quality along the line.