PETpla.net Insider 04 / 2017

EDITOUR PET planet Insider Vol. 18 No. 04/17 www.petpla.net 13 Tour Sponsors: From pellet to shelf by Alexander Büchler February 14, 2017 We met: Mr Bambang Mujianto, Production Manager Indofood is a comprehensive food manufacturing company and also operates supermarkets. Thanks to help from Asahi from Japan, they have now broken into the beverage sector. Using aseptic bottling technology, they are penetrating the market. One example is RTD coffee which they can offer in their own store for half the price of the other competitors. Over the last two decades, Indo- food has progressively transformed itself into a total food solutions com- pany with operations in all stages of food manufacturing, from the pro- duction of raw materials and their processing, to consumer products for the market. 2013 Indofood entered the beverage business through joint ven- ture (JV) companies with Asahi Group Holdings Southeast Asia Pte. Ltd., established in 2012. In 2014 Indofood expanded its beverage business by entering the packaged water business, with the acquisition of packaged water assets including the Club brand. The Bever- ages Division offers a wide variety of beverage products from ready-to-drink (RTD) tea and coffee to packaged water, carbonated soft drinks and fruit flavoured drinks. The business is conducted through two JV companies with Asahi – PT Asahi Indofood Bev- erage Makmur (AIBM), which han- dles manufacturing; and PT Indofood Asahi Sukses Beverage (IASB), which handles the commercial operations of non-alcoholic beverages. The division has an annual production capacity of around three billion litres. The divi- sion’s products are marketed under Ichi Ocha, Tekita, Caféla, Club, Pepsi, 7Up and Fruitamin brands. We visited the plant in Sukabumi, which is operated as part of a JV with Asahi. An aseptic bottling plant for teas, coffee and coconut juice was built here on a greenfield site in 2014. We were greeted by Mr Bambang Mujianto, the production manager. We went out onto a gallery from which we could see the manufacturing areas. The tour started in the “kitchen” where the raw ingredients for the tea, coffee and coconut juice are mixed together and processed. After the UHT, the products are transported to the bottling room which has a clean room class of 100,000, and the actual aseptic area a class of 100. The dry aseptic bottling line with 800b/min was made by Sidel. Two SMI facilities pack the bottles in cartons of 12 or 24 at a rate of 40 times per minute. Overall, 1,500,000 cases are made in one month. An automatic storage system takes the completed pallets. Internally alone, 3,000 plastic pallets are in operation. High-bay storage is provided for 1,200 pallets. The fully automatised plant has a capacity for two more lines. The aseptic facilities only have to be deep cleaned every 120 hours making it possible for the employees to produce products five days a week in three shifts. “It’s important to have solid training on the machines” says Mr Bambang. “Aseptic doesn’t just need good machines, it also needs good staff.” Ichi Ocha RTD Green Tea is one of Indofood Asahi’s products. It is a green tea made from Ichiban tea in 350ml & 500ml sized bottles. The coconut juice with desiccated coconut and Caféla is a RTD coffee made from coffee beans, crafted with mixture of cream milk and creamer, in 250ml bot- tles. At 3,000 IDR (some 0.21 Euro) the coffee is extremely good value in the shop. “We can only get the good price because of the aseptic technol- ogy,” says Mr Bambang, adding “The reason is the lighter bottles which are therefore better value, have a better aroma and are faster in comparison with hot fill.” With these prices, Indo- food is about 50% cheaper than the competitors. While Asahi has a 51% say in the manufacturing and all of the designs and beverage development comes from Japan, Indofood has a 51% say in sales. So the company stocks its own supermarket chain with the aseptic products. www.indofood.com www.sidel.com www.smigroup.it The aseptic bottled coffee only costs 21 euro cent, 50% less than the hot filled competitor. The SMI facilities make 1,500,000 cases per month. Mr Bambang Mujianto, Production Manager gives a tour of the plant