Metsä Board, DS Smith and Valmet cooperate to make the Kemi mill more “intelligent”


Metsä Board, a leading European producer of premium fresh fibre paperboards and part of Metsä Group, is putting the latest artificial intelligence to good use at its Kemi mill (Finland) in order to improve the runnability of its white kraftliner on a customer’s corrugating line. Metsä Board will be collaborating with DS Smith, a leading provider of corrugated packaging solutions operating across 37 countries. The analytical solutions and technology are supplied by Valmet, the leading global developer and supplier of process technologies, automation and services to the pulp, paper and energy industries.

“We strive at continuously developing the high performance of our paperboards. In paperboard production there are several quality parameters that we need to balance. With the data coming directly from the customer’s converting lines we can find the optimal combination. In addition, we can follow the effect of the supply chain on the quality parameters, for example, the moisture content of the board during transport,” says Ari Kiviranta, SVP Development at Metsä Board.

Metsä Board’s Kyro mill began using artificial intelligence for quality management on its folding boxboard machine last year. Metsä Board is also continuing to investigate different possibilities to implement artificial intelligence on other production lines.