ABB Ability™ solutions combine ABB’s deep domain expertise with connectivity and software innovation to empower real-time, data-driven decisions for safer, smarter operations that maximize resource efficiency and contribute to a low-carbon future. Our large portfolio of digital solutions helps organizations automate, optimize, and future-proof their business to achieve new heights of performance and drive sustainable progress.

ABB has built and maintained a leadership position in the distributed control system (DCS) market for more than 40 years by preserving its customers' capital investments while providing new capabilities. The control system of tomorrow will accelerate innovation on behalf of producers for decades to come.

With a strong installed base globally, ABB is a key partner of the sugar industry to achieve high yields, uniform quality, and high plant utilization with minimized energy losses and environmental impact.

Sugar processing is an energy intensive industry that requires precise control and continuous reliability, especially during seasonal production cycles. 

The ABB Ability™ System 800xA distributed control system provides a single interface to control sugar production at every stage, allowing manufacturers to provide competitive products, increase profitability, decrease the cost of production, and grow their business in an era of increased globalization and food security concerns.

What it takes to build a smarter factory:

• Report by ISA: Sugar factory automation strategy
  
• White paper: Digitalization in sugar industry
• Article: Taking control of sugar plant emissions
  
• Free evaluation: How cyber secure are you?
  
• Sugar Library: Learn how it helps to increase engineering and operation efficiency
• Brochure: Sugar plant automation & optimization

ABB envisions that Process Automation Systems of the future will empower industries to compete in a fast-changing world by delivering adaptable and reliable, integrated, modular and secure automation solutions with flexible, simpler and faster project engineering execution and commissioning.

The vision will facilitate digital transformation and collaboration between people, systems and equipment through secure OT/IT integration, for autonomous operations and sustainable performance, thereby ensuring the safety of people and the environment.

Investments will be protected by allowing users to continuously and seamlessly evolve their existing DCS installed base to meet future needs.

Either using the Advanced ABB Ability ™ System 800xA application library to reduce engineering time and focus on plant optimization or deploying the System 800xA APC (Advanced Process Control) system, which uses MPC (Model Predictive Control Technology) for optimization of PID controllers to reduce variations, helps sugar manufacturers boost plant reliability, energy savings, and cost efficiency. 

Sugar producers face specific manufacturing challenges.

• Optimize energy consumption.
• Reduce material use and inventory costs.
• Increase asset utilization and throughput.
• Improve quality and reduce variations, errors, and waste.
• Maximize material traceability and fulfil regulatory compliance.
• Embrace an agile manufacturing environment.

To overcome these challenges, a connection between the shop floor (Level 0 – Field Level) and the ERP (Level 4 – Enterprise Resource Planning) business system is required. 

ABB Ability™ Manufacturing Operations Management (MOM) suite provides the backbone for optimized operations by enabling the control and insight needed in effective production-, quality-, inventory- and maintenance operations and connects shop floor to the ERP System.

In today's sugar industry, running several plants in the same region or globally is a challenging task in terms of operation, supply chain, data, and KPI management. ABB has tools under the ABB Ability™ platform to address these issues while connecting plants to achieve success.

Benefits of connected plants

• Process (hardware and software) standardization and minimization of process deviations
• Effective data collection and sharing between plants
• Cost savings in inventory management
• Collective production and supply chain optimization
• One-click performance and productivity analysis
• Setting uniform plant KPIs
• Fast input to trading and market analysis
• Real-time data input for CAPEX and OPEX decision-making processes

According to ARC Advisory Group, ABB has got the world's most popular distributed control systems (DCS). - System 800xA, Freelance DCS and other heritage brands. We are No.1 over a decade and delivered automation solutions  to more than 100 countries, in a variety of industries.

ABB's extended automation system ABB Ability System 800xA and its ergonomic control room design have won multiple awards. Control engineers and operators love this user-friendly system for its ability to meet their needs and its outstanding integration capabilities between the control room and the shop floor. ABB Ability System 800xA with a pre-engineered sugar control library is a perfect fit for continuous process automation solutions and for automating the sugar production process.

ABB Ability System 800xA standardizes control loops, shortens engineering and implementation phases, and enables users to focus on system optimization.