The project “Vision and Artificial Intelligence for hide grading” gets under way

Innovative technological solutions thanks to the opportunities of Industry 4.0

The technical feasibility study ‘Vision and Artificial Intelligence for hide grading’ has recently got under way, a project coordinated by Leather Cluster Barcelona with the participation of three cluster member companies: Intarex, Picvisa and Curtidos Badia.

This project has received funding from ACCIÓ (Ministry of Business and Knowledge), within the framework of the competitive strengthening grants for members of the Catalunya Clústers Programme 2021-2023. The objective of this collaborative project, with innovation as its focus, is to study the technical feasibility of a vision and artificial intelligence system for the automatic grading of hides, a technological solution that should enable companies to become more competitive by reducing their costs and improving their productivity.

The grading of hides at the different stages of the leather transformation process is a key factor for the quality of the manufactured product, customer satisfaction and the operating results of tanneries. It is a process that today is carried out manually, based on the skill of workers with the aptitude to perform the operation for hours on end, using mental patterns learned through accumulating a great deal of experience, in order to distinguish between different types and combinations of defects that allow them to grade each hide into different categories. It is an operation of great importance for its economic impact on the business, given that the cost of hides as a raw material is usually around 50% of the total manufacturing cost.

The key technology in the project consists of the use of vision and artificial intelligence techniques for image processing. Specifically, machine learning (deep learning) techniques will be used in order to build computational models that make it possible to identify what type of defect is present in an image: parasites, scratches, knife cuts, etc. It is envisaged that in the future the project could be extended to address the traceability of hides.

The member companies taking part in the project are experts and international benchmarks in their field of knowledge, and their combination is a unique opportunity to achieve the project’s purpose:

• • Picvisa, an innovative technology-based company that offers solutions based on robotics, artificial intelligence and machine vision, is present in more than 15 countries with over 275 units installed for a wide range of applications. Its equipment can sort and classify materials by composition, shape and/or colour on the basis of its own software.

• • Intarex is a high-technology company, a leader in the development and deployment of integrated software solutions, with more than twenty-six years of experience helping to make the leather industry more competitive through technology and supporting it in its digital transformation.
  • Curtidos Badia is one of the leading companies in the world of leather and a benchmark in the fashion market and in the high-quality leather sector at international level. Its experience in the sector dates back to 1889 and it has become a benchmark company in innovation and sustainability, today exporting more than 90% of its production.