Construction of the Riihimäki snack plant – the greatest individual investment in the history of Valio Ltd – started three years ago. The goals were ambitious.
"Our aim was to build a competitive, efficient, flexible, and safe plant that meets future requirements and is environmentally sound," explains Project Manager Jukka Partti from Valio.
According to Partti, the new factory offers the opportunity to create new and innovative products and to flexibly adjust product properties according to consumers' wishes. Flexibility is not the only advantage the plant offers – it is also ecological and energy-efficient, saving a third of energy compared to the old plant in Riihimäki.
Insta's trump cards: experienced and Finnish
According to Partti, Insta impressed with its competence and capacity early on, already during the bidding process. Insta's strongest cards included familiarity with the old Riihimäki plant and skilful Finnish resources.
"Insta succeeded in putting together a competitive tender and convinced us with their competence and capacity," says Partti.
In October 2014, Insta Automation and Valio signed a preliminary engineering contract on which the program descriptions and system architecture specifications were based. In September 2015, after the process automation engineering contract was signed, the Engineering unit of Insta started work – to begin with, designing bus technology and automation cabinets, process automation system design, and programming.
Cabinet Manufacturing and Installation business units join the project
A third contract was signed in October 2015. It included the distribution cabinets implemented by Insta Automation's Cabinet Manufacturing as well as the electricity, instrumentation, and automation installations carried out by Installation."It was great to be able to provide the customer with all turn-key solutions under one roof," says Tommi Komu, Group Manager, Food and Chemical Industry at Insta Automation.
"Because we had done several projects with Valio in the past, we could utilize the existing competencies and strengths of our employees."
According to Komu, the scope of the project is perfectly illustrated by the person-years spent on it: Approximately 25 person-years were spent on project management, engineering, and programming; 32 on installation and manufacturing.
Komu praises Valio for their flexible and smooth cooperation. According to him, a good example are the FAT tests – where systems were thoroughly tested together with Valio personnel – carried out on Insta's premises. Partti agrees: "Cooperation with Insta has been very good throughout the entire project, and we have been able to tackle challenges as we've faced them." The end result meets the set requirements very well.
Tommi Komu
Tommi Komu Vice President Industry & Infra Insta Automation Firstname.lastname (at) insta.fi
