A growing market for beer has led Bali Hai Brewery Indonesia to install a new canning line, accommodating a higher production capacity while securing the quality of their premium beers. Designed and supplied by Sidel, the line runs at up to 33,000 cans per hour for the 330 ml format, twice as fast as the former one, and features a very compact layout, thus overcoming the Indonesian brewer’s space constraints.
As the country’s leading independent brewery, Bali Hai Brewery Indonesia has been developing and distributing a distinctive range of beer brands for the national and international markets since 1975.[1] “Currently our products are sold in more than twenty countries, including Russia, Singapore, Thailand, Japan, Korea and New Zealand, as well as different regions of Africa. While capturing the opportunities offered by a consumer demand that is continuously increasing, we are committed to maintaining the consistent taste and quality of our beers,” explains Daniel To, Technical Director at Bali Hai.
With a domestic market share of 3.2% in 2018, the family-owned company is the fourth largest domestic brewery and the first one behind global brands, offering a portfolio that speaks to the consumers’ increasing preference for local as well as premium beer brands. These include Bali Hai Premium, Draft Beer, El Diablo Original and Panther Black. Regardless of the strong Indonesian regulations to control alcoholic drink consumption, the beer segment in the country is showing a very positive trajectory: it is set to register a 7% total volume CAGR to reach 324 million litres by 2023. To keep up with this growth, Bali Hai decided to invest in a large-scale project and – in doing so – opted to partner with Sidel for the very first time.
The journey started when Bali Hai undertook a major renovation and automation of their brewhouse and cellar area in 2013, when many processes were still performed by manual labour. As part of their investments in the past few years, they also decided to upgrade their canning line, managing 330 ml and 500 ml formats, to fit their needs for higher efficiency. This is where Sidel stepped in with their expertise in line design and engineering, deriving from their long-standing heritage in complete solutions for beer. The leading Indonesian player was offered a layout and equipment choice perfectly accommodating their needs for secured quality, while opening doors to additional capacities and being prepared for future challenges.
360° support rooted in complete beer line expertise
“The floor space available at our plant is limited; therefore, we needed a very compact solution that did not compromise on efficiency and flexibility,” explains Daniel. The project started with the search for the right location within the site, always considering the need for additional capacity. “Despite the fact that we were initially planning a line delivering 24,000 cans per hour (cph) for the 500 ml format, we eventually trusted Sidel’s engineers and went for a complete line that is able to reach up to 29,000 cph, thus securing high capacity production for the coming years,” he goes on.
There were a number of important reasons for the Indonesian brewer to put their confidence for such a large-scale revamping in Sidel. “First and foremost we appreciated the local service support as well as the time that the team took to understand and analyse our requirements. Thanks to their highly competent and responsive engineers, the installation of the line was completed in a short period of time,” says Daniel. At the moment, Bali Hai has the possibility to run the new canning line in three shifts, while the old one only allowed for a maximum of two.
Proven filling and pasteurising systems for full control of beer quality
The Sidel complete canning line includes 13 different machines, laid out in six larger production modules: the de-palletiser, the filler and seamer, the pasteuriser, the dryers, the shrink-wrapper and the tray shrink-wrapper, plus conveying systems. Bali Hai’s goal of protecting beer quality was mainly achieved through the integration of two specific solutions in the line: the latest Sidel volumetric electronic filler for cans and the proven PAMA pasteuriser.
When explaining the rationale behind the choice of the filler, Blegog Sugiono, Packaging Manager at Bali Hai, highlights, “We opted for this Sidel filling technology largely because of the very low total oxygen pick-up it ensures, which ultimately leads to high product quality. Plus, we now use a volumetric technology, so as to guarantee that our cans all have the intended quantity of product when reaching the shelf.” This way, there is no risk of product waste.
