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Valmet signs long-term agreement to accelerate Mercer’s digital transformation

Mercer International has entered into a long-term partnership with Valmet to accelerate its global digital transformation program.

The first step towards implementing this agreement begins with replacing the distributed control systems (DCS) at the Mercer Peace River pulp mill in Alberta and the Mercer Celgar pulp mill in British Columbia with the Valmet DNA Automation System.

“We wanted a partner that can provide a strong DCS solution but at the same time help improve our performance through better data utilization, improved internal benchmarking and collaboration across all our sites. We chose Valmet because of their expertise in pulp combined with extensive automation offering and strong digitalization capabilities,” says Christoph Grewe-Franze, CIO, Mercer International.

Valmet DNA is a single automation system for process, machine, drives and quality controls. It has an intuitive user interface that offers relevant information to users based on their roles. This allows for collaboration and real-time performance optimization based on data analytics.

According to a statement released by Valmet, Mercer will benefit from better and connected DCS data communication and analysis of real-time performance across all its operations. This will improve diagnostics and troubleshooting while reducing redundancies and downtime.

“We are happy to continue our long-time collaboration with Mercer International with this significant agreement. We have a full automation and digitalization offering to manage and optimize processes, including cloud connectivity, analytical applications, and full support both locally and remotely to serve the needs of our customers in various industries. We are delighted to build these capabilities together with Mercer to increase their competitiveness,” says Sami Riekkola, president, Automation business line, Valmet.