Cutting-edge Enterprise Artificial Intelligence® and powerful process automation systems work together to maximize production yields, enhance product quality, conserve energy and reduce costs.

Leading Enterprise Artificial Intelligence® provider Noodle.ai and SMS group, with its digital business fields − trailblazer in digitalization for plant and equipment used in steel and nonferrous-metals production and processing − today announced a partnership to jointly further optimize the world’s first learning steel mill for Arkansas-based Big River Steel.

To help Big River Steel conserve resources and control energy output, SMS group and Noodle.ai came together to couple the deep experience SMS group has in the metals industry and process knowledge with Noodle.ai’s AI expertise. The joint solution was created by implementing Noodle.ai’s learning algorithms into SMS group’s X-Pact® MES 4.0. Noodle.ai was able to seamlessly leverage the fact that SMS group’s X-Pact® MES 4.0 was engrained into the steel mill’s IT environment and into their SaaS (Software as a Service) applications. The new end solutions digitize applications throughout every stage of the steelmaking process – starting at the liquid phase all the way to strip finishing.

Noodle.ai’s software and Enterprise AI Data Platform analyze historical and current high-frequency data from the mill’s about 50,000 sensors attached to SMS group’s equipment. Noodle.ai uses the mill's data plus these sensor values and external data sources to sense, predict, and recommend corrections that maximize production yields, enhance product quality, mitigate safety risks, and minimize costs.

For example, these insights can help minimize transition losses regarding steel grade, strip width or strip thickness, and predict how much energy is being consumed by the mill each hour and/or each day. This allows the steel mill to trade back energy to the market or change production schedules to make consumption more predictable.

“By working with SMS digital, we are empowering an industry to turn business challenges into competitive advantages through the use of Enterprise AI®,” said Noodle.ai CEO Steve Pratt. “Our mission is to create a world without waste. Given the intensive energy and material needs of the metal industry, efficiency improvements will not only improve business operations and the bottom line, but positively impact the entire ecosystem that surrounds manufacturers.”

“In order for SMS group to implement digital solutions and therefore increase value for customers like Big River Steel, we knew that strong partners with excellent AI and machine learning capabilities were essential,” said Bernhard Steenken, CEO at SMS digital GmbH. “Noodle.ai’s solutions gave our existing tools within Big River Steel’s mill the power to help them achieve maximum plant performance with minimal maintenance effort, along with high product quality and revenues.”

As early as 2017, Big River Steel has been a LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) credential holder.