CIMPOR pioneers Industry 4.0 in cement manufacturing with private 5G

CIMPOR Global Holdings has transformed three Portuguese cement plants into fully connected, intelligent operations using private 5G.

With 10,000+ sensors, autonomous drone inspections, and real-time remote support, the company is unlocking an estimated $10 million in annual economic impact.

In partnership with Vodafone Portugal and Ericsson, CIMPOR has built what is believed to be the largest industrial IoT deployment in the global cement industry.

Cement plants are among the most difficult environments for wireless networks—reinforced concrete, heavy steel structures, confined spaces, and sprawling outdoor quarries.

At CIMPOR, legacy Wi-Fi resulted in:

• Inconsistent coverage across critical operations
• High interference and unreliable performance
• Fragile architectures with single points of failure

As the company moved to connect thousands of sensors for predictive maintenance, automation, and AI-driven operations, connectivity became the limiting factor.

CIMPOR partnered with Vodafone Portugal and Ericsson to design and deploly a private 5G network tailored for cement manufacturing. Following proof-of-concept validation, the private 5G solution was deployed across the Alhandra, Souselas, and Loulé plants and delivers:

• Sub-10 ms latency
• Up to 1 Gbps throughput
• Seamless indoor, outdoor, and confined-space coverage

Built on Ericsson’s Private 5G with MOCN architecture, the network enables shared infrastructure while dedicating performance to mission-critical industrial use cases.

Predictive maintenance at scale

More than 10,000 sensors monitor vibration, acoustics, temperature, and rotational data from motors, drives, kilns, and mills across CIMPOR's Portuguese plants. AI models analyze this data continuously, detecting anomalies weeks or months before equipment failure occurs—reducing unplanned downtime and extending asset life.

Drone inspections in hazardous spaces

Indoor and outdoor drones use real-time 5G video to inspect ducts, silos, and confined spaces—replacing days of scaffolding setup with inspections completed in hours, without workers entering hazardous environments. Private 5G enables drone operations even inside the 130-year-old Alhandra plant, where conventional wireless had never reached.

AR-enabled remote assistance

AR glasses stream live video over private 5G, connecting on-site technicians with remote experts for complex repairs. Procedures are recorded and preserved—capturing institutional knowledge before experienced workers retire.

Paperless, mobile operations

Workers access SAP on tablets over private 5G from anywhere in the plant, logging jobs, photographing equipment, and ordering parts in the field. All three Portuguese plants are fully paperless.

CIMPOR's private 5G deployment is delivering measurable gains across financial performance, worker safety, and environmental impact:

• USD 10M estimated annual economic impact from approximately 1 percent overall efficiency improvement across CIMPOR's Portuguese plants
•  Up to USD 1M per plant in annual savings through avoided downtime and asset failures, based on CIMPOR's internal assessments
• 140,000 tons of CO₂ emissions reduction associated with private 5G-driven efficiency gains
• 100% paperless operations across all three Portuguese plants
• Collision prevention and PPE detection systems deployed across quarries and production floors, improving worker safety

CIMPOR has since awarded Vodafone Portugal and Ericsson the contract for a fourth site, with 16 units across three continents in scope for replication of the private 5G model.