The Challenge: Extracting Data Reliably
A large US chemical manufacturer faced a significant operational challenge: efficiently processing Material Safety Data Sheets (MSDS) received from various suppliers. Each shipment of chemicals came with an MSDS that needed to be attached to the company’s central repository. Employees manually read these documents to transfer and summarize critical data into a standardized format used for creating safety labels on packaging. This manual process was time-consuming, error-prone, and inefficient, especially given the diversity of the MSDS documents:
• Variety of Formats: Over 90 example MSDS documents were available, following the same underlying structure but presented in more than 10 different supplier layout templates.
• Mixed Media: Some MSDS were scans of hardcopy documents, adding complexity to data extraction.
• Uniform Language but Diverse Layouts: All documents were in English but differed significantly in design and formatting.
The company aimed to prove that an AI-driven workflow could replace the manual MSDS-to-Label step, allowing for graceful failure handling by requesting human-in-the-loop support when necessary.
The Solution: AskUI’s Vision Agents for Intelligent Automation
To address these challenges, the chemical manufacturer partnered with AskUI to implement an AI-based automation solution. The key components of the project included:
• Vision Agents for Automation: Utilizing AskUI’s Vision Agents and their intuitive API, the company automated the extraction of data from MSDS images, regardless of varying formats or whether they were scanned hardcopies.
• Automated Data Extraction: The system was fine-tuned on the available MSDS documents to recognize and extract essential information needed for safety labels, effectively handling over 10 different supplier formats.
• Retraining Loop for Enhanced Accuracy: A continuous retraining loop was established to improve the AI’s accuracy over time, adapting to new MSDS formats and reducing errors.
Impact: Exceptional Automation and Efficiency Gains
• Achieved 99% Automation: Successfully automated the MSDS to Label process, with 99% of documents processed without the need for human intervention.
• Increased Operational Efficiency: Significantly reduced the time and resources spent on manual data entry, allowing staff to focus on more strategic tasks.
• Improved Accuracy and Compliance: Enhanced the reliability of safety labels, ensuring compliance with industry regulations and improving overall safety standards.
• Scalable and Adaptable Solution: The retraining loop allows the system to adapt to new document formats and suppliers, making it a future-proof solution.
