Delivery Time Reduced From 48h To 12h! How Does Longlide Build A Fully Automated Intelligent Factory?

On September 18-19, the 2025 Printing and Packaging Industry Economic Forum and National Printing Managers Annual Conference was grandly held in Hangzhou, Zhejiang. At the conference, numerous industry experts delivered a series of brilliant presentations, inspiring participants with new ideas and directions. We will gradually compile the highlights from the annual meeting, with more exciting content to look forward to!

This issue features the speech by Xu Longping, Chairman of Longlide Intelligent Technology Co., Ltd. (hereinafter referred to as Longlide), titled 'Digital and Intelligent Drive: Exploration and Practice of Benchmark Intelligent Factories.'

In the context of reshaping industrial patterns through new quality productivity, the deep integration of technology and manufacturing is becoming the engine for the transformation and upgrading of traditional manufacturing industries. As a pioneer in intelligent printing manufacturing, Longlide, guided by Industry 4.0, has built an intelligent factory system that spans the entire chain of design, manufacturing, logistics, and services, creating a new model of green, efficient, and interconnected smart factories, opening up new pathways for the upgrading of the printing industry.

Overall Situation of Factory Construction

Currently, the printing industry is transitioning from large-scale, extensive production to a model of small-batch, multi-batch, personalized customization with rapid response. Facing this trend, the printing and packaging industry, still considered traditional, must seek breakthroughs. To this end, Longlide has always been committed to shedding the "three hats" of 'traditional capacity, traditional industry, and traditional products,' achieving development breakthroughs through intelligent construction.

With over twenty years of experience in the printing and packaging field, Longlide's services cover a wide range of industries including daily chemicals, fast-moving consumer goods, food, photovoltaics, and electronics. Responding to new demands, the company took the construction of an intelligent technology industrial base in Chuzhou, Anhui, as an opportunity to launch intelligent transformation, introducing new technologies such as industrial internet, big data, and artificial intelligence. This has enabled the creation of a digital intelligent factory with visibility, controllability, and traceability throughout the entire process from order to delivery, reducing the production and delivery cycle from 48 hours to less than 12 hours.

Longlide is promoting full-process automation and informatization from raw material warehousing to finished product outbound, enabling digital perception and intelligent management at every step. This smart factory is not merely a point-based transformation but a systemic reconstruction. Based on Industry 4.0 concepts, the enterprise has established a four-level collaborative architecture of "device layer - control layer - execution layer - decision layer," achieving a complete closed loop from physical manufacturing to intelligent decision-making.

The device layer forms the physical foundation of the smart factory. The factory has introduced high-end automated production lines, palletizing robots, intelligent logistics systems, and printing machines from Germany, Italy, Japan, and other countries, and through independently developed software, enables interconnectivity between equipment from different manufacturers.

The control layer serves as a bridge connecting the physical and digital worlds. A high-speed communication network built on industrial-grade PON and industrial Ethernet, along with independently developed MDC systems, allows real-time collection of equipment status, process parameters, and production data.

The execution layer is the central nervous system of factory operations. Systems such as ERP, MES, WMS, APS, and QMS function in their respective roles yet coordinate effectively to achieve a closed-loop production of "planning-execution-feedback."

The decision layer is the "intelligent core" of the factory. Through CRM and SCM systems directly linking customers and suppliers, all data converges at the BI intelligent management center. With big data analysis and visualization technologies, it provides management with panoramic operational insights and data-driven decision support.

The key to intelligent manufacturing lies in letting data "speak for itself": when yield improves or efficiency drops, the system can actively identify problems and provide feedback, achieving a transformation from "human monitoring equipment" to "equipment-driven management."

Speech by Xu Longping, Chairman of Longlide, at the Annual MeetingIntelligent Construction of Key ScenariosIf the four-tier collaborative architecture is the skeleton of Longlide's smart factory, then the implementation of intelligent scenarios constitutes its muscles and soul. Focusing on three major areas-R&D design, production operations and management, and operational management-Longlide has built a full-process digital and intelligent system, achieving a complete closed loop from blueprint planning to physical operations.1. R&D Design Stage: Innovation Driven by DataLonglide has established a product knowledge base and model library, utilizing big data and AI technologies to analyze historical designs, customer feedback, and market trends, realizing intelligent recommendations for structures, materials, and processes, as well as generative design. Through digital modeling of processes and real-time optimization, the enterprise can adjust parameters based on actual production data, enabling online process optimization and dynamic improvement, significantly shortening the product finalization cycle.2. Production Stage: Building an Efficient Collaborative System with IntelligenceIn the production stage, Longlide follows the core path of "automation + digitalization + greening" and promotes two main lines of "intelligent operations" and "systematic management" simultaneously to create an efficient, collaborative, and sustainable smart manufacturing system.At the operational level, the company utilizes an intelligent control center for real-time equipment monitoring. AI machine vision inspection systems are deployed in key stages such as printing, die-cutting, and gluing, providing comprehensive online inspection and quality alerts for printed packaging products. The RGV/AGV automated transportation system and intelligent material scheduling systems work together to manage raw material delivery, semi-finished product transfer, and finished product warehousing, achieving unmanned operations and full-process visual management.At the management level, Longlide focuses on three areas: intelligent warehousing, smart scheduling, and intelligent energy management, fully enhancing manufacturing efficiency and resource utilization. Intelligent palletizing machines and automated high-bay warehouses enable smart material storage and path optimization; combined with barcode and RFID technology for precise positioning and dynamic monitoring of raw materials, semi-finished, and finished products, forming an efficient and traceable warehousing and logistics system. The APS-based smart scheduling and dynamic dispatch system, deeply integrated with ERP, MES, WMS, and other platforms, generates optimal production plans within seconds considering equipment capacity, material inventory, and staff shifts, and implements dynamic scheduling.In terms of intelligent energy management, intelligent sensing and control equipment is deployed at key energy-consuming points such as compressed air, lighting, and air conditioning. Through the EMS system, water, electricity, and gas consumption data are centrally monitored and analyzed, enabling categorized, zonal, and time-based statistics and visual management. The system can automatically calculate energy consumption per unit product, identify abnormal fluctuations, and link energy data with MES, ERP, and other systems, forming an "energy-production-cost" collaborative optimization loop, driving green and lean production processes.3. Operational Management: Achieving a Value Loop through Intelligent CollaborationAt the management level, Longlide uses the CRM system to create a 360° customer view, making order status, production progress, and logistics fully visible. The SCM system provides precise supply chain profiling and performance analysis, connecting procurement, settlement, and collaboration data. The BI system and data analytics platform integrate multi-source data from ERP, MES, WMS, etc., and visualize the enterprise's overall operations on the intelligent control center dashboard, enabling data-driven, scientific decision-making by management.From virtual simulation to actual production, Longlide has transformed the concept of smart manufacturing into an operable system, making data not only visible but also actionable, providing a practical model for the digital and intelligent transformation of printing and packaging enterprises.

Longlide Intelligent Factory Overall ArchitectureEffectiveness of the Intelligent Factory: Longlide as a Model of New-Quality Smart ManufacturingAfter years of continuous construction and optimization, Longlide's smart factory has become a vivid example of the industry's "new-quality productivity." The company has successfully created a new model of intelligent manufacturing characterized by five features: automated equipment, transparent production, intelligent logistics, mobile management, and data-driven decision-making. This model has achieved multidimensional improvements in production efficiency, quality, and energy consumption.Following digital transformation, Longlide's smart factory has shown significant overall operational effectiveness. The production process has become fully visible and precisely controlled, product quality stability has been markedly enhanced, production efficiency has greatly increased, and both defect rates and energy consumption per unit have decreased simultaneously, indicating substantial progress in intelligent, green, and lean manufacturing.Thanks to its leading achievements in intelligence, Longlide has successively been recognized as a national pilot demonstration enterprise for digital transformation, a national pilot enterprise for the integration of informatization and industrialization standards, and an intelligent factory in Shanghai and Anhui Province. It provides a replicable model for the industry in the construction of intelligent manufacturing scenarios.

Longlide firmly believes that the core of intelligent manufacturing lies in making the flow of information a true driving force for production and using data as the basis for continuous optimization and decision-making upgrades for enterprises. In the future, Longlide will continue to drive intelligent upgrading through innovation, shape competitive advantages through green manufacturing, promote collaborative innovation across the upstream and downstream, and build a new open and shared ecosystem for printing and packaging. From 'manufacturing' to 'intelligent manufacturing,' from 'production' to 'service,' Longlide is writing a new chapter in the high-quality development of China's packaging industry through systematic Industrial 4.0 practices.