Manufacturers are already deploying a host of digital technologies; the challenge in many instances is that these are being implemented in isolation. A new whitepaper by MPA, a leading professional services business, looks at the individual elements needed for smart manufacturing and how, through integration, UK manufacturers can unleash the power of the smart factory.
The starting point, as with any modern business process, is data. Data flow, collection, cleansing, manipulation and analysis. Then the data needs to provide meaningful outputs or insight. To be able to do this successfully, identifying clear areas for improvement within a manufacturing facility involves integration of different technologies, including both hardware and software. Many manufacturers are able to identify one or two functional processes that can be optimised in isolation to deliver improvements but few are adopting a holistic smart factory approach.
The new whitepaper looks at how UK manufacturers can exploit the data they have by creating an integrated, fully connected and flexible manufacturing environment.
Nigel Urquhart, Senior Technical Analyst at MPA comments: “The main elements of the smart factory are Big Data processing capabilities, the industrial internet of devices and services and advanced robotics. It’s key that UK manufactuers, who are investing in new technologies, take a step back and think about how each of these different elements can connect and effectively talk to each other.
“Having a clear vison of what you want to achieve is the first challenge. Then you can work through how you are going to achieve it, identifying what the company’s digitalisation strategy will be and where to go for funding. Only then can you focus on what the different elements will be in your smart factory and how they can be integrated to provide the outcomes the business needs. This isn’t an easy process but doing it well will put you way ahead of the competition.”
For more information the MPA ‘Unleash the Power of the Smart Factory’ whitepaper is available as a free download here: https://mpa.co.uk/whitepaper-unleash-the-power-of-the-smart-factory/
