The Factory
Our nutrition is becoming more and more diverse – from low carb to gluten free, vegan or paleo: today, food is no longer just simple nourishment but also an expression of our personality and lifestyle choices. With every emerging food trend, new challenges for the food industry arise as individualized food requires an adjustment of the production and the processes involved. Another important factor is the desire of consumers to retrace their products and for intelligent packaging material that provides information on the shelf life of food, which require new solutions in the industry.
By means of industry 4.0 technologies, the research alliance smartFoodTechnologyOWL develops new product and production approaches in order to connect individual systems via modern information and communication technology.
Following objectives should be pursued:
- Improvement of food quality and security
- Improvement of the production processes’ sustainability and economy
- Increase of transparency for the consumers
- Lasting support of the food industry’s competitiveness
Further projects are being developed at the Future Food Factory OWL, our research and demonstration platform for the future of food technology at the Innovation Campus Lemgo. Both participating corporate partners and consumers benefit from the research results, as they can obtain safe, high-quality and sustainably produced food.
Competences
Together with partner companies, we develop, research and demonstrate innovative food technologies and individual solutions. They form the basis for improving the quality, safety, sustainability and cost-effectiveness of food production. This takes place independently of day-to-day operations and thus provides the ideal breeding ground for creative approaches and solutions.
In cooperation with Campus Foundery OWL, our Start-Up Space offers employees and students space and expert support to bring their own ideas and inventions to market maturity with their own start-up project.
Through training courses, seminars, individual workshops and lectures, we provide access to our research expertise in the field of the digital transformation of the food industry.
We look forward to your visit!
Equipment
The Future Food Factory OWL has a wide range of facilities in the factory hall and laboratories for research purposes.
Foyer
The foyer can be used as an event room and for workshops. Events for up to 60 people can be held in the foyer.
Direct access from the foyer to the shop floor means that a hands-on session can be integrated into workshops.
Further rooms and equipment
Further rooms and laboratories with specialised equipment are located in the following areas:
International
Since 2018, Ostwestfalen-Lippe University of Applied Sciences together with the Food Processing Initiative e.V. are German partners in the European smart Sensors 4 agri-food network.
The Thematic Smart Specialisation Partnership ‘Smart Sensors 4 agri – food’ was launched in 2018 to contribute to the development and roll-out of Smart Specialisation Strategies (RIS3) in the involved regions in a way that the agri-food sector evolves into an interconnected, sustainable, resilient, and smart ecosystem built upon competitive food processing companies that embrace the principles of Industry 5.0 and environmental sustainability.
Currently, SS4AF connects 20+ partners (clusters, RTO’s, regional authorities, …) across 40+ NUTS2 regions in 9 EU countries. SS4AF fosters collaboration between agri-food clusters, tech providers, and stakeholders to drive digital innovation in food processing SME’s, bringing together concrete challenges and digital solutions in one ecosystem. We connect competences, share knowledge and foster green and digital transformation in food processing SME’s towards an interconnected, sustainable, resilient and smart agri-food system in Europe.
Our goals:
- FACILITATING a sustainable, resilient, and smart agri-food systemin Europe
- CONNECTING competences across sectors and regions
- DEVELOPING and implementing solutions
- SHARING knowledge and visions
- FOSTERING green and digital transformation in food processing SMEs
With SS4AF, we strongly focus on the food processing industry and in particular the SMEs´ perspective. Their needs and challenges form the basis for the strategy of the partnership. To facilitate and enable the implementation of digital technologies that can provide solutions to the concrete needs and challenges of the food processing industry, other stakeholders play a crucial role, in particular the technical companies (machine manufacturers, digital solution providers).
Visit ss4af.com for further information
Food safety and quality, sustainability of production processes and product innovations are the driving forces for research and development in the Institute for Life Science Technologies, an institute of the Ostwestfalen-Lippe University of Applied Sciences. Food-oriented and research-active university lecturers of the Life Science Technologies department have joined forces in order to develop common topics through more intensive cooperation and thus to sharpen the profile of Lemgo's food technology. In addition to the technological and scientific exchange between practice-oriented research and industrial implementation, the ILT.NRW offers a range of services primarily for the needs of the food industry and its suppliers. Advanced training and science-to-business transfer are further priorities.
The Institute Industrial IT (inIT) at the Ostwestfalen-Lippe University of Applied Sciences is one of the leading research institutions in the field of intelligent automation. Industrial communication, engineering and configuration, image processing, information fusion, analysis and diagnostics, human-technology interaction, authentication and medical databases (data infrastructures) are among the institute's areas of expertise. Since 2006, more than 70 employees have been working on publicly funded joint projects or industrial contract research projects. The inIT is one of the leading research institutes in the ‘it's OWL – Intelligent Technical Systems OstWestfalen-Lippe’ cluster of excellence.
