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Surveillance tools or technologies that help in delivering the very best
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Wednesday, 19 October, 2011, 08 : 00 AM [IST]
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Pradeep Chona
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True to what its director Pradeep Chona believes, "quantity is long forgotten but quality is not," Havmor, a leading ice cream manufacturer from western India, is known for making ice cream using milk and milk fats. Not only that, since its inception in 1944, the company has believed in tempting people to literally Have More or Havmor.
The company, with its new state-of-the-art plant, has tripled its production capacity this year taking the production to 2 lakh litres a day to keep pace with rising demand in the market.
The company has ISO 9001: 2008- / HACCP-certified manufacturing facility, qualified and experienced personnel and believes in "Achhai, Sachai and Safai."The company is a winner of many awards including Best Ice Cream at various local and national level competitions.
Role of surveillance systems
For companies such as Havmor, there are various options of surveillance tools available in the form of CCTV cameras, data loggers, GPS (Global Positioning System) with temperature indicators, refrigeration unit timer and other vehicle- and temperature-tracking monitors. These tools help companies like Havmor to deliver their very best to their customers and stay ahead of the rest of the players. Let us understand, CCTV cameras and GPS systems, the two tools that Havmor majorly use in its pursuit of upgrading technology and maintaining quality.
CCTV cameras
The use of CCTV has become increasingly widespread throughout the world over recent years. Originally deployed for protecting large establishments, food processors and monitoring city centres, CCTV systems are now installed routinely within shops, schools, and even individual vehicles on the public transport or processed food transport network as a mandatory requirement by the police. Additionally, the market has undergone a rapid transition from analogue to digital recording technology, which has had a significant impact on the design and functionality of CCTV systems.
Analogue CCTV recording systems were relatively simple to design as they relied mainly on the use of VHS (Video Home System) tapes to capture the images. Digital recording systems, by contrast, are much more complex to specify. They record onto a hard drive, which can only store a limited amount of video; when it is full the oldest material will be overwritten with new. Therefore when specifying a system thought must be given to the capacity of the hard drive, the provision of a suitable method to create a permanent record of any key incidents (e.g. DVD writer) and the use of compression (which will affect the recorded image quality). Many of these issues are inter-related; thus improved recorded picture quality and higher frame rate may come at the expense of a reduced retention time on the system.
Advances in CCTV technology are turning video surveillance into one of the most valuable loss prevention, safety / security and management tools available today. Retailers use CCTV to monitor for shoplifters and dishonest employees, compile recorded evidence against bogus accident claims and monitor merchandising displays in stores that may be hundreds of miles away. Manufacturers, governments, hospitals and universities use CCTV to identify visitors and employees, monitor hazardous work areas, thwart theft and ensure the security of their premises and parking facilities.
Application of CCTVs at factories
Specially designed industrial use camera systems are used for product inspection, but normal camera systems are used to monitor work progress. The aims of these systems are to analyse work processes for higher productivity or to monitor dangerous locations to document accidents. In particular, surveillance cameras are installed in clean rooms or other locations that workers cannot easily access, so that the work operating conditions or instruments are monitored. Since specially designed camera housings may be required in factories for protection of the camera against dust, heat or chemicals, care is needed when designing the factory systems.
Application of CCTVs at Havmor
At the company, over 200 CCTV cameras have been installed across both of its production plants. These devices help monitor activities in real-time from anywhere in the world. CCTV devices work as third of the production supervisors who make sure that a proper level of temperature is maintained. It also helps in employee safety and helps avoid malpractices such as theft.
GPS
The GPS is a space-based global navigation satellite system (GNSS) that provides location and time information in all weather, anywhere on or near the Earth, where there is an unobstructed line of sight to four or more GPS satellites. It is maintained by the United States government and is freely accessible by anyone with a GPS receiver.
Commercial use of GPS
Invented for the US Army, GPS is now available for civilians. Most of the corporates have adopted GPS as it delivers the following benefits.
Monitor the Speed of the Vehicle - A GPS-tracking system monitors the speed of the vehicle. Whenever the speed limit is exceeded, one gets an alert and a report.
Know the Exact Location - Let's say someone just turned on a computer and wants to login to the central station to find out where a particular vehicle is at that moment. GPS lets him / her do that without any trouble. He / she simply logs into the system and finds exactly where the vehicle is at that point in time.
Signal Update Interval - One can set the desired update frequency of the signal of a GPS device. For instance, if someone does not wish to track vehicles very often, he / she can set a frequency to 30 minutes. Otherwise, he / she can set it to 2 minutes and know where a particular vehicle is precisely every 2 minutes.
Use of GPS at Havmor
Delivering good ice cream is equally important as making good ice cream otherwise all the efforts go in vain.
Keeping pace with 30-35% growth annually, the company expanded to Rajasthan and Maharashtra and explores every market in these regions.
For a company with its production hub in Ahmedabad, it is a tough task to keep up with delivery as it brings with it a lot of challenges. However with GPS in place, the company has benefited as follows:
Ensuring timely delivery in a controlled-temperature environment throughout the products' journey from mother warehouse to outlets / distributors and also keeping track of it.
Maintaining the quality of the products and ensuring avoidance of any temperature shocks.
Locating the vehicle in crisis, when, perhaps, the driver needs assistance.
In fact, the benefits go beyond the few mentioned above.
The latest GPS system in each of the company's Refrigerated Delivery Vehicle allows the company to monitor various factors such as the exact location of the vehicle, temperature of the vehicle, speed of the vehicle and all this in real-time and that too from anywhere.
For companies such as Havmor such surveillance tools provide an additional support to meet consumer expectation of high quality.
Hence it will not be an overstatement to say that surveillance tools are not just controll
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