Innovation in software engineering: bringing reverse vending machines to life
TOMRA Collection careers:
The software powering TOMRA Collection’s reverse vending machines (RVMs) is crucial to the seamless experience they deliver for consumers – but how is that software developed, and what role does it play in the process of returning drink containers for recycling?
Erling Markussen, Senior Software Engineer at TOMRA Collection, explains more about how the team’s collaborative approach to problem solving helps them create the software solutions that keep TOMRA Collection’s reverse vending machines ahead of the game.
Breathing life into TOMRA reverse vending machines
The inner workings of TOMRA Collection’s reverse vending machines are highly sophisticated, having continually evolved over the years to meet the changing demands of markets and harness innovations in technology.
This means that today the reverse vending machines TOMRA produces are genuinely industry leading, providing solutions that help both businesses and individuals significantly increase their rates of recycling. In addition, the drive to innovate and continually improve how these reverse vending machines perform remains – and that makes it an incredibly exciting area to work in.
While many software engineers might find themselves in jobs where they only are focused on creating algorithms to run inside large machines in the cloud, the work at TOMRA provides the opportunity to both work with cloud solutions and in the embedded software world.
What’s really exciting about our multi-disciplinary work at TOMRA is that the physical operations of the machine are critical, too. We have exposure to creating algorithms to support cloud computing, but we also have exposure to the small intricate details around the physical moving parts that really make our machines come to life.
“We work closely with different disciplines across TOMRA’s business to find the solutions we need, whether that’s to improve an existing machine, solve a challenge we’ve identified, or to create a brand new product. The software team is always engaged with multiple perspectives, and this gives us a real appreciation of the bigger picture, which makes our work even more satisfying.”
A typical day working within TOMRA Collection’s software development team could involve working with system architects, taking their sketches, and finding software solutions that turn these into reality and allow ideas to be tested. Alternatively, members of the software team could find themselves working closely with the optics or electronics teams to build a whole concept for a new machine. At TOMRA, the whole chain of production sits in house, and this means the software team are engaged throughout the entire process rather than working in a silo.
Problem solving through software innovation
For the software team at TOMRA, problem solving is key. It’s something Erling says can make his job feel like detective work – a point exemplified by the team’s experience finding a solution during a scarcity of the microchips used within TOMRA’s reverse vending machines.
In 2021 the industry was experiencing a shortage of microcontrollers, so TOMRA had to switch manufacturers. However, the microcontrollers that were available on the market were not fully compatible with TOMRA Collection’s reverse vending machines. This meant it fell to the software team, together with the electronic team, to collaborate and redesign the circuit boards. Then they restructured the software and made it compatible with the available microcontrollers.
Their role was vital because, without a solution, the business would have had to cease producing its reverse vending machines until the original microprocessors became available again – a situation that would have presented a huge commercial challenge.
“Thankfully, we were able to find a solution to the shortage. The team were able to restructure the code related to the alternative microcontrollers by introducing a more layered architecture. Essentially, by keeping the code specific to the microcontroller separate from the application layer, we were able to add device drivers for the new chip and create a solution,” says Erling Markussen.
“This was quite a complicated process, however. We needed to be able to verify that the new boards were acting in the correct way and this meant developing tests for a range of different elements, such as the stepper motor controller and the power box, to make sure their performance was the same as when using the previous microcontroller. Really, it was all about problem solving, working together to create potential solutions and then testing these rigorously until we found a solution that we were confident could work at scale.”
Innovation in software – it’s embedded
The culture of innovation that enabled TOMRA Collection to overcome chip shortages is not new to the business – it has underpinned the success of its reverse vending machines for many years. This culture of continuing innovation has seen the business move from its first RVM models (which featured small monochrome displays, low-resolution graphics and a small microprocessor) to more advanced models that have integrated sophisticated software solutions to enable touch screens and create an enhanced user experience.
As part of these developments, TOMRA Collection’s reverse vending machines have moved beyond storing limited information on internal microcontrollers to utilizing integrated cloud systems that hold huge amounts of data. From a consumer perspective, rather than waiting to receive their deposit refund physically at a machine, it’s now possible for them to receive this directly to their bank accounts, and even allows retailers to integrate this into their store loyalty programs.
The software team’s work has also enhanced the ability of the reverse vending machines to identify specific drink containers and track their progress through the machine all the way through to compaction. This is done by looking at different physical movements inside the RVM and has improved the trackability of bottles’ movement through the machine, providing greater insight into how efficiently and effectively the machines operate.
The future of reverse vending software
With so much already achieved, what does the future hold for reverse vending machines, and what are the new challenges likely to be faced by software engineers operating in this space? According to Erling Markussen, it’s about increasing efficiency and volume.
The future of reverse vending is really exciting, and there are opportunities for software engineers to make a real impact as we look towards solutions that can help further increase recycling across markets globally.
“As we work to increase those rates, I think we inevitably need to look at volume and find ways to efficiently increase the number of drink containers that are processed by our reverse vending machines. At the moment, singulation of containers inside a reverse vending machine is still relatively time consuming if you have a lot of containers. However, by harnessing technologies like machine learning and three-dimensional point clouds, we can create new algorithms to interpret the shapes of bottles at scale. This could significantly boost efficiency – leading to many more containers being recycled.”
Engineering the talent pipeline
While TOMRA has a rich heritage of innovation, and the opportunity to embrace new approaches to maximize recycling rates through RVMs is ripe, this can’t be realized without a new generation of talent.
As TOMRA looks to continue to bring forward industry leading solutions, working with enterprising and talented software engineers will be crucial. Without them, it won’t be possible to find the solutions the future demands.
That is why the business is always on the look-out for creative and ambitious software engineers who want to help power the resource revolution that will be central to the world’s most pressing environmental challenges.
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