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Sanofi oral suspension: from blow/fill/seal to robotic palletizing

At Sanofi’s Origgio facility outside Milan, automated efficiency is the watchword when it comes to packaging Enterogermina Oral Suspension. Additional production capacity is in the works.

The Robocombi system mechanically picks the strips of bottlepacks from the conveyors they stand in and places them directly into the four parallel conveyor lanes leading to the packaging line.
The Robocombi system mechanically picks the strips of bottlepacks from the conveyors they stand in and places them directly into the four parallel conveyor lanes leading to the packaging line.

Among Paris-based Sanofi S.A’s more popular products is Enterogermina Oral Suspension, a probiotic used to treat diarrhea and other gastrointestinal problems. It’s sold in 73 countries (though not in the U.S.), and 58 of those markets are supplied by the Sanofi plant in Origgio, Italy, just outside Milan. That’s where four BFS BP 460 aseptic blow/fill/seal systems from Rommelag are producing 5-mL bottlepacks made of low-density polyethylene that feed into secondary and tertiary packaging equipment supplied primarily by Marchesini.

According to Luca Angelini, Technical & Information Services Manager at Sanofi, the Marchesini packaging line became necessary in 2016 when the third and fourth Rommelag systems were added. Soon, he adds, a fifth and sixth BFS BP 460 will be installed along with a new Marchesini line that will replace an existing packaging line that dates back to 2007. For now, the 2016 line accepts the output of all four Rommelag machines. Since each of these blow/fill/seal systems is capable of 20,000 individual bottlepacks/hr, the Marchesini equipment has to be mighty capable, to say the least. Helpful, as we’ll see in a minute, is a clever buffering system at the very beginning of the 2016 line, which is the line we’ll look at in this story.

The aseptically filled low-density polyethylene bottlepacks emerge from each Rommelag BFS BP 460 in a continuous belt and enter a Rommelag cutting device that separates them into strips of 10. (For a video of the Rommelag BFS BP 460, go here pwgo.to/5089.) These strips drop right side up onto a conveyor that leads to the Marchesini packaging line. So the 10-count strips of bottlepacks are in four parallel lanes as they reach the packaging line.

As long as all machines on the packaging line are running smoothly, a Marchesini Robocombi system automatically picks the strips of bottlepacks from the conveyors they stand in and places them directly into the four parallel conveyor lanes leading to the packaging line (see photo at left). But if any downstream packaging machines are paused for any reason, the incoming bottlepacks are instead loaded by the Robocombi into the trays of the Marchesini buffer system. As soon as the downstream equipment is back up and running, the buffer feeds the packaging line with the bottlepacks stored in it, following a FIFO logic. With blow/fill/seal operations, where any stoppage is problematic because it represents a halt not just in a filling system but in a combined extrusion/blow/fill operation, this buffering system makes an important contribution. By providing up to 45 minutes of accumulation, it helps to minimize instances where the upstream blow/fill/seal systems have to be halted due to downstream stoppages of any kind.

Dual-head labeler
A short distance downstream from the buffer system is a Model DL200-2TA dual-head pressure-sensitive labeler from Neri, a Marchesini division. Because it has two application stations, there’s no need to stop production when it’s time to change label rolls.

Integrated into both application stations is a Novexx thermal-transfer printhead from Avery Dennison that prints product information as well as variable data such as lot number and expiration date on each label. Four SEAVision cameras—two for one application station and two for the other—inspect for the presence and accuracy of the variable data. Near the machine exit is a fifth SEAVision inspection camera to make sure the label itself is on straight and is not folded over on itself or otherwise compromised. Should there be anything wrong with either the printed data or the positioning of a label, that strip of bottlepacks is rejected from the line.

Label rolls hold blank, unprinted pressure-sensitive paper labels 10-across. A Marchesini Robocombi system with four arms picks four strips of bottlepacks coming from the four parallel infeed conveyors (see photo above) and lays them flat in the flights of the labeler’s infeed conveyor, one per flight. So as these strips proceed through the labeler, the individual 5-mL doses are lined up 10-across, and one pressure-sensitive label—freshly printed with variable information—is applied to each 5-mL container.

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