The sorter has improved product consistency and increases production volumes.
Inaba Peanuts Co., Ltd. produces more types of food than its name suggests. Established more than a century ago as a maker of rice crackers in 1918, the business began to specialize in processing peanuts since 1947. It now also produces snacks such as almonds, cashews, walnuts, chestnuts, Japanese dried plums, almond fish, and fried beans. At its four factories in Gifu Prefecture in central Japan, the company’s mission is to produce foods with “safety, security, and deliciousness”.
Inaba’s almonds and cashews became so popular that the company faced two significant challenges. One was the need to increase output to keep up with demand - but production rates were restricted by bottlenecks because of heavy reliance on manual sorting. The other was to achieve fewer variations in product quality because the traditional method of manually sorting nuts was limiting achievable consistency.