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Three friends, a passion for a
pint and a good idea.
That’s all it took to get the
now successful Kingsland-based
Urbanaut Brewery Co underway.
Co-founder Bruce Turner, who
previously worked as an engineer
for two breweries in the UK, says
their overall goal is to brew fresh
beers, introduce new flavours to
loyal beer drinkers and convert
those yet to discover the joys of
craft beer.
Callaghan Innovation has helped
the company invest in making
their processes more efficient
and effective with automation and
IoT as well as stay ahead of the
increasingly crowded market.
A student grant is also being used
to support Urbanaut’s first time
using food science to create new
products using their brews and
by-products.
A chemical engineering student
from AUT is working on utilising
their yeast to create a premium
yeast extract spread similar to
Vegemite or Marmite.
“Vegemite and Marmite are both
made from excess brewer’s yeast,
typically from big commercial
breweries like DB and Lion,” says
Turner. “Every time they make a
batch of beer, they’d end up with
twice as much as they need for
the next batch, so typically you’ve
got to dump the rest down the
drain. With peanut butter you get
the cheap brands, or you can
pay three times the price for the
premium peanut butter. It’s the
same with jam and honey. No one
that I’ve heard of has made a yeast
extract using brewers’ yeast from
a craft brewery.
“I got thinking why no one has
done a craft version of a yeast
extract. We do lots of different
styles of beer, so we are planning
to learn how to make a yeast
extract and see if there’s a
difference between the different
sorts. People can try the beer
and then taste the extract that
came from it.” The company has
also introduced new software to
monitor exactly what is put into
the beer, for example water, power
and ingredients, versus how much
beer is produced.
This enables them to determine
where they are experiencing losses
so they can alter their processes to
reduce and recover.
The software is also helping to
improve processes and, in some
places, introduce automation to
reduce some of the literal heavy
lifting.
university students to map food
waste across various companies
as part of their ‘Sustainable
is Attainable’ initiative. This
work gauges the internet of
thing’s (ioT) potential use in
finding ways to reduce food
waste across companies in the
South Canterbury region. This
involves businesses working
collaboratively to achieve positive
results for their industry sector
and the wider community.
Health and Safety:
Smart Kiwi companies are using
co-bots to work alongside their
workers to improve their health
and safety. These robots can
reduce mundane and repetitive
tasks allowing employees to work
in higher value roles.
Embracing digitisation:
An overarching digital strategy
is an essential part of the 4.0
CASE STUDY
URBANAUT BREWERY CO REFINING
THEIR BREW
AI-powered computer vision can identify and sort specific food items on packing lines
Raspberry pi type devices
can be added to
analogue equipment
for digital solutions
Callaghan Innovation partner with
businesses of all sizes to enhance
New Zealand’s innovation ecosystem
Founders/directors of
Urbanaut Brewing from left -
Simon Watson, Thomas Rowe
and Bruce Turner