Label production speed increased by 150%

Approximately 1.7 million packages are lost or stolen every day across the global goods shipping industry. Traditional tracking methods rely on barcodes or QR codes, scanned at specific points, but they offer little visibility between stops. Reelables, a British start-up, enables real-time logistics tracking from warehouse to doorstep with its Bluetooth and 5G smart labels. To meet growing demand, Reelables needed to increase its speed of production. That’s where PC- and EtherCAT-based Beckhoff control technology came in.

Reelables founder Brian Krejcarek had the idea for the company at an unusual moment: he was climbing a hill when he realized that he’d forgotten his ChapStick. This thought evolved into a larger vision: what if there was a way to actively track objects and know what you’re missing before you leave the house? Originally imagined as a business-to-consumer (B2C) concept, Reelables pivoted to a business-to-business (B2B) model, recognizing a bigger opportunity in sectors such as freight forwarding, logistics, and warehousing.

The company’s goal was to create a tracking label that was so low-cost and scalable, it could be attached to almost anything, eventually replacing traditional barcodes or QR codes with active trackers that constantly broadcast their location. Today, Reelables produces two types of smart labels:

• Bluetooth tracking labels designed for asset tracking across a wide range of industries, ideal for high-value logistics where delay costs are significant
• temperature-sensitive labels that are accurate to 0.5°C and are used in cold chain applications such as seafood transportation

According to Reelables, both logistics companies and end customers benefit from this real-time tracking. The labels, which are similar in shape and size to a credit card, are supplied on reels that can be directly integrated into automated label application processes, replacing traditional paper or plastic labels entirely.

Collaboration with the automation specialist

Oliver Boswall-Perks joined Reelables in 2019 and, in his role as a mechatronics engineer, was tasked with expanding the company’s manufacturing capabilities: “Reelables is the only company producing labels that have an integrated printed battery. There are several advantages to this. First, our smart labels are categorized as packaging, meaning that they don’t need to be declared at customs. Second, the labels can pass through standard waste streams, aligning with the sustainability goals of our customers.”

Having worked with Beckhoff in a previous role, Oliver Boswall-Perks reached out to Bradley McEwan, business development manager at Beckhoff UK. “Reelables approached us with a great proof of concept – a smart Bluetooth label that was gaining popularity in the industry – but their early production set-up wasn’t built for scale,” explains McEwan. “They needed to shift from a manual process using non-industrial hardware to a fully automated, high-speed manufacturing line.”

Before working with Beckhoff, the Reelables team was producing thousands of labels in a ten-hour shift. As demand grew, the team built up the system, layer by layer, always aiming to increase speed and throughput and improve quality. “It was a classic chicken-and-egg scenario,” adds Bradley McEwan. “You need a product to go to market, but you can’t invest heavily in production infrastructure until there’s demand. As the company’s labels started selling well, it became clear that they needed a fully automated system that could grow with them.”

The collaboration started with a face-to-face meeting at Reelables’ site in London. Beckhoff looked at the company’s existing set-up, and spoke to Oliver Boswall-Perks and the team about what they were hoping to achieve. From this, Beckhoff engineered a new system from a series of discrete manufacturing modules into which Beckhoff’s TwinCAT automation software could be integrated.

The technical implementation

The new production system is based on the Beckhoff automation platform, which is fully integrated with TwinCAT and EtherCAT. In addition to TwinCAT software, the system features industrial PCs, drive technology, EtherCAT Terminals, real-time vision systems, and multi-touch control panels as HMIs. Reelables also benefited from being an early adopter of TwinCAT Vision and Motion integration. Their system runs on Beckhoff’s SPT Application Framework – the first implementation of its kind in the United Kingdom. The architecture supports easy expansion and integration of future machines, making it extremely scalable. The framework provides a structured, modular approach to machine sequencing and is fully PackML-compliant. “What really made the difference was that Beckhoff wasn’t just selling us hardware,” adds Oliver Boswall-Perks. “The experts helped create the whole system – vision, motion, logic – all working together. That level of support is rare, especially for a company of our size.”

Reelables also engaged Beckhoff’s engineering services. Beckhoff product engineer Chris Knight led the programming effort, working on-site with the Reelables team to develop the machine code, logic, and sequence control over several months. “With a small team of just ten people, Chris Knight’s insight was invaluable,” adds Oliver Boswall-Perks. He brought extensive expertise that accelerated our progress and helped the team quickly get to grips with the system. He played a key role in mentoring us and connecting us with Beckhoff’s wider network of motion and vision experts, which massively sped up the process.”

Performance boost through optical quality control

The TwinCAT Vision system plays a critical role in quality control. It captures high-resolution images of each label as it moves through the line, calculating precise rotational and positional offsets, checking for defects, and ensuring that glue is dispensed with micron-level accuracy. Importantly, the system also flags and skips labels that would fail further downstream.

The system now captures images of multiple labels simultaneously, enabling faster processing and greater consistency. This allows Reelables to maintain quality at high speed, now producing tens of thousands of labels per shift – a 150% increase compared with the previous system. “Switching to TwinCAT meant that we could integrate real-time vision into the process, something that we relied on humans for before,” says Oliver Boswall-Perks. “Now, not only is production faster, but the quality hasn’t dropped at all. In fact, it’s more consistent.”

Looking ahead

Reelables is building a full digital record of every label, with data captured at multiple checkpoints throughout the production line. This feeds into an AI-driven analytics system designed to predict failure risk based on adhesive dispensing quality, chip placement, substrate condition, environmental factors, and more. The system can take real-time corrective actions – such as skipping chip placement or epoxy application – to conserve resources and improve yield and production time.

A next-generation vision system is also underway, with multiple cameras deployed across key inspection stations, all managed by a single Beckhoff Industrial PC. This infrastructure supports machine learning models that will soon classify failures as manufacturing- or field-related, closing the loop between production and real-world performance.

To meet growing demand for labels, Reelables is scaling up production with two new compact lines and a high-throughput system – the Stratus R22M – designed to produce tens of thousands of labels per hour. Three of the four core machines for the Stratus R22M are already built or fully engineered, positioning Reelables to dramatically increase capacity and reduce lead times. “Working with Beckhoff has been a game-changer for us,” concludes Oliver Boswall-Perks. “We are now prepared for our next phase of growth, and everything that comes beyond that.”