The need to satisfy quickly changing consumer preferences is transforming operations throughout the food industry, making flexible, efficient lines more important than ever. To meet these demands, food industry professionals can turn to solutions at PACK EXPO Las Vegas (September 28-30, Las Vegas Convention Center), owned and produced by PMMI, The Association for Packaging and Processing Technologies. The event— this year’s largest processing and packaging trade show in North America—will feature technologies and solutions to improve flexibility, food safety and more. To meet increasingly diverse consumer preferences, moves toward greater process flexibility and small-batch production are transforming operations. Solutions to support these trends include automation technologies such as robotics, which improves efficiency, boosts production speeds and reduces costs.

Sponsored by Rockwell Automation and its PartnerNetwork program, the Center for Trends & Technology (CTT) (Booth C-4829) will feature informative kiosks, an interactive wall and educational sessions to demonstrate how the latest technologies can give manufacturers a competitive edge. Experts from industry-leading companies such as Rockwell Automation, Cisco, Microsoft, Gratek Systems and Stone Technologies will address issues and solutions.

To shed light on breakthrough technologies and techniques with applications in a wide variety of industries, suppliers will take to the Innovation Stage (Booths C-1041, C-1045, C-1049 and N-559) to present free, 30-minute educational sessions. Topics will include automated packaging, object detection, anti-counterfeiting technologies for packaging and much more.

Attendees can also sit in on sessions at the Food Safety Summit Resource Center (Booth S-7632), where they can also have one-on-one consultations with experts to address questions on regulatory compliance.

 The Processing Zone in the Upper South Hal will feature advanced solutions that deliver safety and quality. Additionally, the Contract Packaging Sourcing Center in the Central Hall Partner Pavilion (Booth C-1257) will have experts on hand to discuss specific packaging needs, show packaging samples and provide information on leading contract packagers.