siliconindia | | May 20198IN MY OPINIONFrom the introduction of ma-chines in the First Industri-al Revolution, to assembly line manufacturing in the Second Industrial Revolution, intro-duction of Computers and technology in the Third Industrial Revolution, we have come a long way in manufactur-ing and technology, and are now in the midst of a massive shift in the form of the Fourth Industrial Revolu-tion or Industry 4.0. When we look around, we see our lives filled with smartphones, smart cars, smart fridg-es and even smart homes. The age of Industry 4.0 has dawned and we need to be ready to run with it. A PwC 2016 Global Industry 4.0 survey of over 2000 respondents across 26 countries and nine indus-tries revealed that 72 percent of oper-ations will be digitized by 2020, com-pared to the 33 percent today. The world's leading industrial and manu-facturing companies are focused on building a strong digital enterprise by developing a digital product and ser-vice portfolio. Digital technologies enable shorter operational lead times, higher asset and resource utilization, and advanced product quality. I believe the turning point for this evolution was the Information Age which has accelerated advancements and innovation in all sectors. The increasing need for cost-effective high quality products and services has catalyzed Industry 4.0. Here is a view of how we see a shift in pri-orities of manufacturing companies based on evolving imperatives in the ecosystem.Every industry, including manu-facturing, is moving towards a sub-scription based economy, shifting from a services approach to a product and platform based approach. Manu-facturing as a Service, Innovation as a Service, and Infrastructure as a Ser-vice are some examples. Manufactur-ing companies are investing signifi-cantly in Industry 4.0 capabilities to help them be more competitive and gain speed to market. This requires a fast pace of change in the core areas of the business. This is a real case of first mover advantage, which may be sustainable as long as the first mov-er keeps innovating by design. Big data, robotics, augmented reality, vir-tual reality, 3D printing, Internet of Things, mobility, sensors and auto-mation are the most prevalent and vi-tal levers of change for convergence of connected workers, connected ma-chines, smart factories and so on. A key component of Industry 4.0 is Data. The ability to get meaning-ful insights into production planning, scheduling, identification of defects and prevention of failures in machin-ery and processes is dependent on our `DIGITAL' LEADING THE WAY FOR INDUSTRY 4.0 & BEYONDBy Ramya Kannan, Vice President ­ Delivery, UST GlobalHolding an MBA ­ Finance & Marketing from the University of Madras, Ramya is also a Research Scholar at IIT ­ Madras and specializes in niche Banking & Finance areas such as Commercial Mortgage, Residential Mortgage, Equity Research, F&A, Document Management, and many others.Ramya Kannan
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