With the help of ABB robots, bottled water provider, Oasis Water Company, has automated a once-hazardous operation and increased its production capacity so much so that the firm is currently the second biggest 5-gallon water producer in the world. With an estimated 60% share in the UAE’s 5-gallon bottled water market, on-time delivery for homes and offices around the country is crucial for the Oasis Water Company — the UAE’s largest FMCG company in the beverage and dairy products segment, currently celebrating its 25th anniversary this year. Built in 1997, Oasis Water’s Dubai-based factory first included a 5-gallon production line featuring rack loaders with a production capacity of approximately 1800 bottles per hour. The firm realised that if it was going to keep up with demand it needed to expand the facility and shift to a fully automated production line. In 2004, the firm began building an expansion to the existing factory, which saw the size of the facility increase by a whopping 216%. As part of the expansion, the company fully automated their 5-gallon production line with the help of two state-of-the-art robots from ABB: the IRB 6600 and the IRB 7600, which can handle payloads of 250 kgs and 500 kgs, respectively. The IRB 6600 loads empty water bottles and places them on the conveyor belt, whilst the IRB 7600 lifts 16 water-filled bottles along with a metal stack holder — weighing a total of 450 kgs — and loads them accurately into massive steel racks. With the company’s previous mechanical rack loader set-up, it was able to achieve cycle times of 29-30 seconds, however thanks to ABB's robots the firm has been able to cut cycle times and increase productivity by an impressive 36%. Dunlea added, “Thanks to ABB robots the factory is now producing 60,000 5-gallon bottles a day, making our facility the second largest 5-gallon water production line in the world. This is a huge achievement that wouldn’t be possible without the robots.”