What are smart factories?
Posted: Thu Dec 26, 2024 4:49 am
An automated production system or a smart factory makes it possible to manage employee absences more efficiently, whether due to illness or quarantine , while ensuring the flexibility needed to quickly adapt to sudden changes in demand or, if necessary, to start producing new products.
In this atypical context in which we live, a smart factory is necessarily a more resilient factory.
How do you build a smart factory?
The transition to a smart factory is not something that happens overnight. First of all, it is essential to draw up a comprehensive strategy that involves the entire organization and in which top management plays a decisive role.
In addition to the involvement of everyone, and in kenya whatsapp number database top management, the transition strategy to a smart factory must be based on three structural pillars: Product, Process and Business Model.
In terms of products, the aim is to develop smart products, such as incorporating electronics and digital components into cars or smart textiles. Technology makes it possible to offer the market products with greater added value.
At the process level, this transition occurs by making products "communicate" with machines and machines communicating with each other through automation and robotization, promoting the digital interconnection of the entire supply chain. It is important to emphasize that digital transformation applied to processes implies the incorporation of information technologies, in order to make these processes more flexible and efficient.
Finally, in terms of the business model, this transition to a smart factory happens by changing the way the product is made available to the customer , complementing the offer with higher value-added services.
Challenges of transitioning to the smart factory model
This transition brings several challenges for organizations, such as:
Use of collaborative methods as a way to enhance innovation;
Combine flexibility and efficiency in production methods;
Manage increasingly smaller series with shorter response times (which implies greater logistical and coordination effort);
Adopt more efficient and advanced logistics models;
Manage ( trace ) products throughout the entire value chain;
Offer increasingly more personalized products, which involves managing a growing number of references;
Adopt a multichannel strategy to interact with different stakeholders – suppliers, partners, distributors and customers;
Leverage information to anticipate customer needs through the use of advanced analytical tools.
We have already seen that the challenges of transitioning to a smart production model or smart factory are great, but the results are worth it. The benefits of automation are clear and stand out even more in this critical period of public health that we are going through.
Advantages of the smart factory
The benefits of automation are evident at several levels, some of which stand out, for example:
Efficiency
Faster operations
Faster decisions
People dedicated to activities with greater added value
Lower Costs
Agility
Response time - Leadtime - reduced
Greater diversity of products
Greater response/reaction capacity
Innovation
Faster availability of new products
Faster prototyping
Greater visibility of innovation
Increased sharing with customers
Customer Experience
Greater transparency and visibility of processes (Supply/Assistance)
More availability
Faster responses
Higher value added services
Costs
Less waste of materials
More quality
Lower Operating Costs
Profits
More market
Greater added value (Products and Services)
Increased Customer Loyalty
The future involves the smart factory
Far from being an “end state”, the smart factory is an evolving solution - which materializes in several aspects such as agility, connection and transparency.
And let us have no doubt that the companies best prepared to survive and prosper in the future are those that have already started on this path, taking consistent steps, one after the other, towards the smart factory. This is naturally a structure better prepared to react quickly to adversity and adapt easily to new realities.
The uncertainty of the times we live in requires that every industrial manager be able to think beyond the immediate. It is important that connectivity becomes part of plans in the very short term, as this is the only way to ensure resilience and overcome the obstacles we face.
In this atypical context in which we live, a smart factory is necessarily a more resilient factory.
How do you build a smart factory?
The transition to a smart factory is not something that happens overnight. First of all, it is essential to draw up a comprehensive strategy that involves the entire organization and in which top management plays a decisive role.
In addition to the involvement of everyone, and in kenya whatsapp number database top management, the transition strategy to a smart factory must be based on three structural pillars: Product, Process and Business Model.
In terms of products, the aim is to develop smart products, such as incorporating electronics and digital components into cars or smart textiles. Technology makes it possible to offer the market products with greater added value.
At the process level, this transition occurs by making products "communicate" with machines and machines communicating with each other through automation and robotization, promoting the digital interconnection of the entire supply chain. It is important to emphasize that digital transformation applied to processes implies the incorporation of information technologies, in order to make these processes more flexible and efficient.
Finally, in terms of the business model, this transition to a smart factory happens by changing the way the product is made available to the customer , complementing the offer with higher value-added services.
Challenges of transitioning to the smart factory model
This transition brings several challenges for organizations, such as:
Use of collaborative methods as a way to enhance innovation;
Combine flexibility and efficiency in production methods;
Manage increasingly smaller series with shorter response times (which implies greater logistical and coordination effort);
Adopt more efficient and advanced logistics models;
Manage ( trace ) products throughout the entire value chain;
Offer increasingly more personalized products, which involves managing a growing number of references;
Adopt a multichannel strategy to interact with different stakeholders – suppliers, partners, distributors and customers;
Leverage information to anticipate customer needs through the use of advanced analytical tools.
We have already seen that the challenges of transitioning to a smart production model or smart factory are great, but the results are worth it. The benefits of automation are clear and stand out even more in this critical period of public health that we are going through.
Advantages of the smart factory
The benefits of automation are evident at several levels, some of which stand out, for example:
Efficiency
Faster operations
Faster decisions
People dedicated to activities with greater added value
Lower Costs
Agility
Response time - Leadtime - reduced
Greater diversity of products
Greater response/reaction capacity
Innovation
Faster availability of new products
Faster prototyping
Greater visibility of innovation
Increased sharing with customers
Customer Experience
Greater transparency and visibility of processes (Supply/Assistance)
More availability
Faster responses
Higher value added services
Costs
Less waste of materials
More quality
Lower Operating Costs
Profits
More market
Greater added value (Products and Services)
Increased Customer Loyalty
The future involves the smart factory
Far from being an “end state”, the smart factory is an evolving solution - which materializes in several aspects such as agility, connection and transparency.
And let us have no doubt that the companies best prepared to survive and prosper in the future are those that have already started on this path, taking consistent steps, one after the other, towards the smart factory. This is naturally a structure better prepared to react quickly to adversity and adapt easily to new realities.
The uncertainty of the times we live in requires that every industrial manager be able to think beyond the immediate. It is important that connectivity becomes part of plans in the very short term, as this is the only way to ensure resilience and overcome the obstacles we face.