Newsletter
NWA SPC Update: March 2008
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Industry News
Upcoming Product and SPC Training
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NWA SPC Update is a newsletter from Northwest Analytical (NWA), the world's leading provider of statistical process control software. Here you will find the latest SPC news and solutions for manufacturers and laboratories.
Industry News
NWA Announces NWA eHACCP Solution™ at Food Safety & Security Summit
Northwest Analytical, Inc. (NWA) will introduce its new NWA eHACCP Solution at the Food Safety & Security Summit in Washington, DC March 17-19, 2008. (See Events and Publications below.)
Studies have shown that active process management and continuous process improvement enable successful HACCP safety compliance. NWA has expanded its established system of plant-floor data collection and process management, analytics, and improvement to encompass the collection, management, and reporting of HACCP-compliant data to provide a powerful food-safety and quality-management system.
NWA eHACCP Solution delivers complete electronic HACCP data collection, compliant data management, and electronic-signature security for producing and managing HACCP documents.
“Food Safety in the Food Supply Chain” Television Program and DVD
Feast or Famine is an international television program that takes an in-depth look into the challenges of feeding the world. NWA was an active participant in episode 102, "Food Safety in the Food Supply Chain," which features the ground-beef-purchase system of the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) as an example of a successful food-safety and quality system.
NWA has posted clips from the program featuring the role of SPC in successful food supply chains and the National School Lunch Program purchasing system for ground beef.
You may have seen the news coverage of the inhumane treatment of downed cattle by Westland Meats and the subsequent beef recall in the US. While the inhumane treatment of animals and potential processing of downed cattle is inexcusable, Westland's after-slaughter processing and delivery of beef was superior in many respects to other beef producers, as Westland was a participant in the National School Lunch Program. It is unfortunate the money and resources invested by Westland (including the use of NWA analytics software) to deliver a very safe product has been overshadowed by this controversy.
You can register to receive a DVD of the program and also view clips of the show online on this page:
MODA Technology Partners / NWA Partnership
MODA Technology Partners (MODA), a software company that provides mobile data-acquisition solutions to the pharmaceutical manufacturing industry, and Northwest Analytical have announced a partnering agreement. This agreement will leverage the power of NWA’s Quality Analyst SPC tool with MODA’s quality-control and environmental monitoring product, MODA-EM™.
OSIsoft ISV Partnership
NWA has finalized an ISV (independent software vendor) agreement with OSIsoft to provide statistics-based analytics for the PI System, an industry-standard enterprise historian. The NWA software will be used to analyze, contextualize, and visualize real-time PI data. This agreement is driven by opportunities with joint OSIsoft-NWA customers that make up OSIsoft’s 11,000 customer base and NWA’s 5,000 corporate customers.
NWA will supply PI users with both smart- and thin-client SPC-based analytics to enable real-time monitoring of process variation on the plant floor and off-line analysis for continuous process improvement at the enterprise level.
NWA Becomes Rockwell Automation Asia Pacific Encompass Partner
NWA has officially joined the Rockwell Encompass Partner program for the Asia Pacific region. This is in conjunction with the recent announcement of the opening of our China office. Our Chinese country manager has already begun to collaborate with the Rockwell Automation Chinese office and distribution channel in pursuing business opportunities.
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Upcoming Product and SPC Training
Applied SPC with NWA Quality Analyst
March 26-27, 2008
Portland, OR
Participants gain expertise using NWA Quality Analyst while applying statistical quality control techniques in classroom exercises. The class then works in teams to solve problems in a simulated manufacturing process. Attendees learn how to maximize their use of NWA Quality Analyst while brushing up on SPC.
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Events and Publications
Food Safety & Security Summit
March 17-19, 2008
Washington, DC
NWA will exhibit in booth 919 and unveil the new NWA eHACCP system. Jeffery Cawley and Dr. John Surak will present “How to Implement an Electronic HACCP Solution” in the Vendor Track Theatre, Tuesday, March 18 from 10:45 to 11:15 AM. The presentation will be in two parts:
- Part 1: System implementation — A compliant electronic HACCP solution requires a secure data-collection system with data management and a secure electronic signature for final documents. The presentation discusses how a standard quality-assurance system of data collection and management can be extended to provide a compliant HACCP solution and how a standard document format can be used to manage electronic signatures.
- Part 2: The Conversion Process from Paper HACCP to an Electronic HACCP Solution — The conversion of a paper HACCP system to an electronic HACCP solution is more than just developing a series of electronic input forms. The conversion plan will include training, validation and verification to properly implement the system. These elements are critical to assure regulatory agencies, customers, and third-party auditors that the electronic HACCP solution is an effective food-safety system.
SPC Best Practice and Quality Systems Day, Adept Scientific
April 23, 2008
Adept Scientific, the NWA distributor for the United Kingdom, will present a day of NWA Quality Software applications including case studies from the National Blood Service and BPB Gypsum at their headquarters in Letchworth, Herfordshire. To register, call +44(0)1462 489134 or email events@adeptscience.co.uk.
Rockwell Automation Fair
At the Rockwell Automation Fair in November 2007, Phil Schreiber, VP Sales, NWA, presented an overview of the current need for real-time SPC and Analytics in manufacturing operations titled, “Comprehensive SPC Based Manufacturing Analytics.” This presentation covered the key attributes and advantages that SPC-based analytical methods provide for supporting process-management and -improvement programs with real-time, predictive analysis. A version of this presentation will soon be available as a webcast on the NWA website.
ARC Forum
NWA participated in the recent ARC Forum session, February 4-7 in Orlando FL, as a Silver-level sponsor. NWA exhibited and showcased the new NWA eHACCP solution and the recently released Building a Better Burger DVD. We would like to thank the customers and partners that stopped by the booth to see these new items and talk about opportunities.
Dubai International Food Safety Conference
Dr. John Surak, a long-time colleague of NWA, was invited by the Dubai Municipality to present two lectures at the Third Dubai International Food Safety Conference. One talk focused on bridging the gap between HACCP and ISO 22000. His other talk focused on US food-processing regulations for companies that would like to export products to the United States.
Food-safety realities suggest there will be wide adoption of ISO 22000 especially in the developing world. As of March 2008, more than 1000 food-manufacturing sites have their food-safety-management systems certified to ISO 2000 internationally. Continual improvement is a hallmark of the standard.
ISO requires food manufacturers to verify their prerequisite programs. An effective and efficient way to accomplish this is by using SPC. Examples of how this is done are reported in the studies of the integration of HACCP and SPC at Butterball Turkey (see “Integrating HACCP and SPC”), and in the article “Analyzing Plant Sanitation Processes Using Statistical Process Control.”
Using an electronic HACCP-data-collection system greatly increases the efficiency and effectiveness of verifying critical control points for both customer and regulatory compliance.
The Dubai International Food Safety Conference is the premier food-safety conference in the Gulf Coast Region. It attracted more than 800 attendees from Africa to South East Asia. It was run in connection with the Gulf Foods trade shows which had over 1200 exhibits from international food-processing companies.“Protect the Food Supply Chain”
Food Quality
December/January 2008
Many food recalls have been linked to safety and quality problems in the supply chain, and media attention has focused mostly on the international supply. Importing food benefits both the consumer and the food processor. Sourcing products or ingredients internationally reduces costs and allows year-long supply. On the other hand, the global supply chain adds complexity to an already byzantine system of food safety, quality, and logistics.
The best solution is to build food safety and quality into the production and manufacturing processes. The most effective food safety/quality design process uses the principles of hazard analysis that are a central part of hazard analysis and critical control points (HACCP).
The supply-chain-management system should:
- Identify key food-safety, quality, and logistic requirements;
- Effectively communicate requirements;
- Use SPC to measure conformance to requirements;
- Link SPC requirements to continuous improvement so suppliers can improve quality and reduce operational costs;
- Use trend analysis to mitigate problems before they occur in the supply chain; and
- Includes a strong accountability system.
“Food Safety Crisis of Confidence”
Food Engineering
January 2008
The article features Cherry Meats and the vendor quality-assurance program of the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) as an example of how to do food safety right.
"A supply-chain success story for SPC is the school lunch program, which is administered by the USDA’s Agricultural Marketing Service (AMS). Long a dumping ground for substandard ground beef and other commodities, the lunch program was putting one of the most vulnerable population segments at risk. Mandating better safety protocols went beyond AMS’s charter, but managers saw an opportunity to leverage their purchasing power to force slaughterhouses, deboning operations and grinders to incorporate SPC to better monitor microbial loads in beef. Sampling by program participants and independent labs such as Silliker helps validate processes are in control, though quality experts emphasize that sampling is a poor substitute for best practices and effective monitoring of a process."
"Steve Olsen and the rest of the AMS staff took a risk with SPC," which also monitors fat content in school hamburgers, says Kerry Pozulp, VP, Cherry Meats, a NSLP vendor. "Adding specs and tests made the meat more expensive at first. Now the price has come down, and the school lunch program is getting better product than anyone."
“Manage Lab Analysis with Process and Quality Control”
Practicing Oil Analysis Magazine
January 2008
Lisa Templeton, a laboratory quality-management consultant and instructor for NWA, has adapted her white paper on Laboratory SPC to the petrochemical industry laboratories. The magazine Practicing Oil Analysis featured the article in their January/February 2008 issue.
“Evaluating and monitoring the measurement process are key activities in any SPC program. Understanding the nature of measurement imprecision and being able to quantify testing imprecision will give the consumers of the data an indication of reliability.”
“Monitoring the testing process at a predefined frequency assures the analyst and laboratory that the test method is in control and that results can be released to production personnel with confidence. Having control standards and charts may be a requirement of regulatory agencies and is an indication that the data produced by the laboratory are defensible.”
“Proper tools such as NWA Quality Analyst, which can store the data, perform calculations and produce a variety of control charts, simplify the monitoring program and reduce laboratory workload.”
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Current NWA Product Release Numbers
Users frequently ask us for the most current software release numbers so we publish them on our website.
© Northwest Analytical, Inc., all rights reserved. NWA Quality Analyst, NWA Quality Analyst Web Server, NWA Quality Information Server, NWA Quality Information System, NWA Quality Monitor, NWA Quality Monitor Supervisor, NWA QAx, and NWA SPCx are trademarks or registered trademarks of Northwest Analytical. *All other company and product names may be trademarks or registered trademarks of those respective companies.
Northwest Analytical (NWA) is the leading provider of SPC software with more than 50,000 licenses shipped to over 5,000 companies. NWA software is recognized for its ease-of-use and ability to integrate with other software and systems. The NWA SPC software suite includes plant floor data collection and supervision, enterprise-wide charting and analysis, web-based reporting and embedded SPC.
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