A pioneering system implemented in the winery in Labastida, Álava, which monitors each bottle, has won the ‘Innovation in SMEs’ category in the Basque phase and will compete in the international phase of the competition.
The ambitious traceability project launched by La Rioja Alta, S.A. at the end of last year at its winery in Labastida (Álava) has won the Basque edition of the Quality Innovation Award in the Innovation in companies (SMEs) category. This places it as a finalist in the international phase of this renowned competition, where a jury panel will choose the winning innovations worldwide, to be announced in Moscow, in February 2022.
This revolutionary system, developed and implemented by the winery presided by Guillermo de Aranzabal, uses machine vision to individually monitor each bottle from the time it is labelled until it is served to each client, distributor or importer, thereby optimizing customer service across the world, thanks to an absolute control of the finished product, the rapid detection and solution of any quality issues, the identification of possible fraud or, on an internal level, the reorganization and optimization of the complex processes of wine movement.
To this end, La Rioja Alta, S.A. has installed a 360° machine vision system which uses five cameras to takes a complete photograph of each bottle and scans the alphanumeric codes on the official seal issued by the Regulatory Board. All this information is then marked on the top of the bottle capsule by means of a Data Matrix code with ultraviolet ink. The code is read automatically and entered in a database, becoming fully integrated in the company ERP.
Quality Innovation Award (QIA) is a competition created in 2007 by Excellence Finland to stimulate the emergence and development of product, process or organizational innovations. The Organizing Committee is made up of entities promoting Quality, Excellence and Innovation from numerous countries. In the Basque Country, EUSKALIT is a member of the QIA Award Steering Committee and, in the local phase, it counts on the collaboration of INNOBASQUE and UNIBASQ for the dissemination and assessment of the nominations.
