Ovako improves production capacity and product quality

Akova Group was founded by the Džafić family and has grown from a single fast-food restaurant in Sarajevo to one of the leading food companies in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the surrounding region.

Ovako, part of Akova Group, produces a range of meat products for both domestic and international markets.

With a growing demand for its sliced meat products, the company needed to find a way to increase production capacity.

Upgrading the slicing line

Ovako’s slicing line processes up to 5 tons of meat per day, including chicken breast, ham and salami. The diameters of the products range from 90 to 110 mm, with a length of up to one meter.

The company invested in 2022 in the DIVIDER line from TREIF, part of Marel, to cover its sliced meat production process from slicing to packing.

The DIVIDER slicer combines optimum use of space with a level of performance expected from a much larger machine. The unique, patented system means that the machine can slice with a high degree of precision.

Immediate impact

"Prior to the line from TREIF, we used to manually fill the machine for products vacuum packaging,” comments Ahmed Kadric, Manager of Operations at Okavo.

"By the installation of the slicing machine, we increased the production capacity and decreased the number of workers," says Kadric. The DIVIDER with smart feed allows an automatic insertion of sliced products in the trays. Efficiency is increased through optimal synchronization of the slicer with the packaging machine. “Before the installation of the slicing line, several manual cutting machines were used, each operated by one worker. Now there is only one worker operating the slicer and one at the end of the line so Ovako could reduce labor,” says Ovidiu-Cecilian Slatina, Product Specialist at Marel. “The slices, which are cut with the TREIF lotus knife, are automatically inserted into the packages. The presentation of the slices in the trays is always uniform in shape, thickness and weight.”

The new automatic scales also helped the product weight to be more consistent and this improved the quality of the product.

Easy to maintain

Since installation, the machine has proven to be easy to maintain and reliable. “The machine is set up in the morning and cleaned at the end of the day. Machine downtime is minimal due to its high reliability,” says Slatina."The satisfaction is confirmed by the fact that this year we bought one more machine from the company," comments Kadric.