USE CASE

INSPECTING BAR CODES AND DEFECTS ON CORRUGATED

BOXES FOR SAFE AND QUICK DELIVERY OF CONSIGNMENTS

CLIENT/INDUSTRY
BACKGROUND

Being a leading company in packaging

and supply, the client provides flexible
packaging solutions to customers across
the world, maximizing value for all
stakeholders.

Corrugated boxes are used as secondary packaging of primary ones. These boxes protect
products from exterior conditions.

CLIENT’S PROBLEMS
1. Due to manual inspection, operators are missing out on checking gaps or holes present
in the corrugated box on a moving conveyor line.
2. Boxes with unreadable barcodes are being shipped for delivery to the customers.
 The image shows the product
coming out of the box due to
the hole in the box.

PROBLEM IMPLICATIONS
1. Products would be exposed to moisture or other atmospheric conditions. As a result, the
quality of products or primary packings may be degraded.
2. Mass returns and recalls are observed due to noncompliance with packaging as per
customers’ requirements.
3. Customs officials pay attention to the information stored in the barcodes. Boxes with
incorrect/unreadable barcodes can lead to delays and even fines.

CLIENT REQUIREMENTS

1. A complete solution for both barcode reading and classification of the defective boxes
with a machine vision system.
2. Reduce existing false acceptance rate up to 5-7 percent.
3. To reroute the boxes having gaps or holes towards the rejection line.
4. To reject the boxes having unreadable QR codes.
CURRENT PROCESS

For inspecting secondary packings (i.e. corrugated boxes), the process is being carried out
manually. 3 operators are deployed across multiple moving lines. The linear velocity of the
moving conveyor line is 90 ft./min. Human operators check for the gaps and holes visually and
halt the line to remove the boxes having such defects.

Moving ahead in the same line, a QR code scanner is installed to read the codes. Boxes with
unreadable codes are auto-rejected through the rejection mechanism.
BUSINESS IMPACT

1. Due to inaccuracies in the detection of gaps and holes, increased returns and recalls are
observed. As a result, the client is facing a loss of revenue.
2. Delays and fines by the customs officials lead to low profitability
3. Products exposed to the outer environment lead to degradation of the quality. As a
result, an additional cost of reparation would be added to the operation cost.

SOLUTION USING MACHINE VISION AND AI

A 4 camera setup is used to acquire images of each side of the boxes. Every camera setup has
integrated lighting (white bar lights) to provide sufficient illumination to the area of interest.
After a dataset of defects is acquired, the defects are trained using an AI-based Anomaly
Detection Module in the software (Qualitas EagleEye® Platform) by performing annotation.

Subsequently, the machine vision system captures the images of the corrugated box, processes,
and identifies defects in real-time.

In the next station, the 1D code pasted on each box would be read. The images of the codes
were transferred to a high-end vision system which read the data present on a box and checked
for any mismatch and the same was displayed for Pass/Fail.
SETUP

 Replaced Manual Barcode Reading With Machine Vision Barcode Reading 

IMAGES
Identifying Defects in QEP (Qualitas EagleEye® Platform)
 CONCLUSION
Followings are the potential benefits of a machine vision system deployed on a production line -

1. False acceptance of unreadable codes can be completely reduced whereas the false
rejection of defective boxes can be reduced to only 2-3%
2. Boxes having holes, gaps, and unreadable codes would be rejected. As a result, the cost
of product reparation can be minimized.
3. Human intervention in the inspection process can be completely eliminated and
therefore the cost of labor and training can be reduced.

http://www.qualitastech.com

Qualitas Technologies Pvt Ltd

53 Kempegowda Double Road, BEML Layout 5th Stage,
Raja Rajeshwari Nagar Bangalore 560098
INDIA
Email: info@qualitastech.com