MANUFACTURING · PLASTICS, PAPER & MATERIALS · PLASTICS & RUBBER

AI Automation for Plastics & Rubber.

Harmony digitizes run reports, streams every press live, catches cycle drift before it fills the regrind bin, and quotes from actual cycle times. One AI-native operating system over everything: your floor, your machines, and the software you already run. No rip-and-replace.

Start with a pilot ROI Calculators & Tools

THE PROCESS

First a digital transformation. Then an AI transformation.

FIG. 01 · THE TWO ARCS

ARC 1 · DIGITAL

ARC 2 · AI

Data engineering is the work.AI is what it unlocks.

THE PHASED ROLLOUT

Three phases of a digital and AI transformation.

PHASE 01

PHASE 1

Lay the Data Foundation · Digitization

Every pen-and-paper record digitized at the station, every software system connected, and all of the data unified into one live layer. The digital transformation starts here.

PHASE 02

PHASE 2

Production & Operations Scale

Factory operations turn proactive: live sensors and machine data, the AI scheduling board, predictive maintenance before failure.

PHASE 03

PHASE 3

AI-Native Operations

Agents across the floor and the back office act on the live layer: quality signals, reports, copilots. Humans approve.

AI USE CASES

Twelve ways the AI layer earns its keep.

Index · 12 use cases

U1

Paperwork Digitization

Use case 01 · PEN, PAPER & EXCEL

Problem. Pen-and-paper operator run reports keyed into Excel days late. Downtime scribbled line-side.

Harmony AI Solution. Operator tablets at the press, backed by direct PLC pulls. Lbs per hour, scrap, and downtime live, even on very high-volume lines.

U2

Live Machine Data

Use case 02 · LIVE MACHINE DATA

Problem. Cycle times live on the HMI, melt temps in a logbook, output counted at the end of the shift. Nobody sees them side by side, and nobody sees them in time.

Harmony AI Solution. Direct PLC connections, Allen-Bradley/Rockwell, Siemens, Omron, Mitsubishi, any brand, via OPC UA or whatever the machine speaks, stream cycle times, melt temps, pressures, and output in real time.

U3

In-Line Quality Intelligence

Use case 03 · IN-LINE QUALITY

Problem. Dimensional and cosmetic rejects surface at QC, hours after the cycle drifted. A full shift of parts carries the same flaw.

Harmony AI Solution. ML on live cycle data flags the drift within minutes and signals the press upstream, before a full shift of parts joins the regrind bin.

U4

AI Search Across All Data

Use case 04 · AI SEARCH

Problem. "Scrap by resin this quarter?" "Margin by mold?" means an ERP export, a quality spreadsheet, a maintenance log, and most of a week.

Harmony AI Solution. Answered in seconds with sources shown, across the ERP, live machine data, quality capture, and lot genealogy.

U5

AI Production Scheduling

Use case 05 · AI SCHEDULING

Problem. Jobs sequenced by hand across presses every morning. A bad sequence burns resin in purges, strands molds waiting on material, and misses due dates.

Harmony AI Solution. AI production scheduling sequences jobs across presses to minimize purge loss and hit due dates against material readiness. The plan proposes.

U6

Yield Optimization

Use case 06 · YIELD OPTIMIZATION

Problem. Resin usage versus spec calculated at month-end. Regrind estimated.

Harmony AI Solution. Resin usage against spec live, by press and by mold. Regrind and scrap weighed and coded at the press, so the largest input cost stops hiding.

U7

Inventory + Shortage Intelligence

Use case 07 · INVENTORY

Problem. Product ships before it exists in the ERP. Inventory goes negative.

Harmony AI Solution. An AI-maintained true-stock layer reconciles the ERP against what the floor actually made, scrapped, and shipped. Groundwork for automated BOMs.

U8

Predictive Maintenance

Use case 08 · RESOURCE INTELLIGENCE

Problem. Tools run past their service window until a hot runner fails mid-run. Press PMs get postponed for rush jobs, and work orders get lost on clipboards.

Harmony AI Solution. Mold and tool memories: shot counts and defect trends drive ML-scheduled tool service. Protected press PM windows only the owner can move.

U9

RFID + Serial Genealogy

Use case 09 · LOT GENEALOGY

Problem. A customer complaint means days digging through paper lot sheets to reconstruct which resin lot ran on which press, which shift, which boxes.

Harmony AI Solution. Lot serialization and genealogy, one-up and one-back: resin lot to press to part lot to customer, answered in seconds. Every serial answers: how was I made?

U10

AI Workflow Automation

Use case 10 · WHEN THE ERP FAILED

Problem. Click-heavy workflows and thousands of messy tables. The floor works around the system instead of in it, and every report starts with an export.

Harmony AI Solution. The tables get normalized into one AI-queryable layer. Additive by default.

U11

Quote-To-Cost

Use case 11 · QUOTE-TO-COST

Problem. Quoting runs on standards nobody believes: estimated cycles, guessed scrap, stale material usage. Winning work that loses money, losing work that would have paid.

Harmony AI Solution. Quoting fed by actual cycle times, actual scrap, and actual material usage from the live layer. Margin by mold known before the quote goes out.

U12

Back-Office AI Automations

Use case 12 · FULL-SCOPE AI AGENTS · FINANCE, SALES, PROCUREMENT, LOGISTICS

Problem. Invoicing keyed by hand from packing slips. Supervisors rebuild the same daily reports in Excel every morning.

Harmony AI Solution. Full-scope AI agents run the workflows across financial, sales, procurement, and logistics: deductions and AR worked automatically, POs parsed from the inbox, and reports written before the morning meeting.

Scope. Financials, sales, procurement, and logistics automations, in the same platform.

01 / 12

YOUR LIKELY STACK

The systems and machines we meet on your floor.

SYSTEMS

IQMS / DELMIAworksPlexEpicorSage X3Global ShopRJG-style process monitoringExcelCustom appsLocal servers

MACHINES

Engel pressesArburg pressesHusky pressesMilacron pressesDavis-Standard extrudersBlow moldersConair auxiliaries

You might run any of these. Or none of them. Harmony is software and hardware agnostic, and we connect live machine data from any PLC brand and any software or custom app.

AI AGENTS

Agents that watch, flag, and act. Humans decide.

Cycle Anomaly Agent

Regrind & Scrap Watch

Phantom Inventory Agent

Mold Shot Counter

Purge Loss Sequencer

Quote-to-Cost Agent

PO Inbox Parser

AR + Collections Copilot

Morning Report Writer

Custom Agents, built for your floor and back office

THE PATTERN WE SEE

The problems we see on every plastics & rubber floor, and why they happen.

The ERP, process monitoring, and quality never connect

The ERP does not talk to the presses, process monitoring does not talk to quality, and resin lots, cycle data, and scrap each live in a different place.

Run reports are written on paper, days late

Operator run reports get keyed into Excel days later, downtime is scribbled line-side, and scrap is guessed at month-end.

Rejects surface at QC, hours after the drift

Dimensional and cosmetic rejects show up at QC, hours after the cycle drifted.

The ERP is so hard to use the floor works around it

Click-heavy workflows and thousands of messy tables mean product ships before it exists in the system, inventory goes negative, and margins distort.

The back office runs on manual work

POs are typed in from emails, invoices keyed into the ERP, deductions and AR worked from spreadsheets, and reports built by hand before the morning meeting.

THE PILOT

$15–20K. 4–6 weeks. One painful problem.

We pick one specific pain point, send engineers to live in your factory for 4–6 weeks, and solve it. One-time payment, working software by week 3, and no obligation to go further. If you do, you choose the modules that you like.

FIRST CALLSECOND CALLCHOOSE PILOTDATA ACCESS FROM ITON-SITEBUILDTESTROIREVIEW

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QUESTIONS, ANSWERED

Do you replace IQMS, Plex, or our ERP?

Additive by default. The AI layer sits on top of what you already run, and when a system deserves to be replaced, we replace it. Sometimes we're the layer on top of your MES. Sometimes we are the MES. When the ERP has failed the floor, we say so.

Can you get live data off our presses and extruders?

Yes. Direct PLC and sensor connections, Allen-Bradley/Rockwell, Siemens, Omron, Mitsubishi, or any other brand, via OPC UA or whatever the machine speaks. Engel, Arburg, Husky, Milacron, Davis-Standard, blow molders, Conair auxiliaries, and RJG-style process monitoring feeds, streamed into the AI layer in real time. Software and hardware agnostic.

Our inventory is wrong and our margins look strange. Can AI fix that?

This is one of the most common patterns in plastics: product ships before it exists in the ERP, inventory goes negative, and COGS distort. We build an AI-maintained true-stock layer that reconciles the ERP against what the floor actually made and shipped, then repair the records underneath. Baseline first, then measure. Estimates are labeled as estimates.

How does the AI get our data?

Read-only connections, scheduled exports, or on-prem. Security is reviewed together in scoping. Read-only pilots: every agent proposes, a person approves. Data engineering is the work. AI is what it unlocks.

Do you work remotely?

No. We always start a pilot in person and on-site, with forward-deployed engineers on your floor. Very rarely do we do anything remotely.

What does it cost after the pilot?

A per-plant annual platform: unlimited seats, no user fees, hardware at cost. The pilot itself is $15-20K over 4-6 weeks against one painful problem, with working software by week 3.

Harmony AI streams every cycle off the press in real time, so drift gets caught before it fills the regrind bin.

Start a scoping conversation →

ADJACENT FLOORS WE RUN

Pulp, Paper & Packaging →Textiles & Apparel →Camping & Coolers →