Are you ready for the next ‘big noise’ in UK Manufacturing?

25 September, 2015

Earlier this year myself and two BFPA colleagues ran a BFPA UK pavilion at the Motion, Drive & Automation (MDA) exhibition in Hanover. Like all German fairs it was impressive on several levels – not least of all the size. However, perhaps one of the most significant features was the astonishingly high profile taken by the latest revolution in manufacturing, Industry 4.0. It was impossible to walk down an aisle in any hall without seeing some mention of this all-pervading ‘philosophy’. I choose the word ‘philosophy’ for want of a better term as depending upon who one speaks to, one is faced with a different definition. Upon returning to the UK, the presence of Industry 4.0 was equally evident in trade journals, advertising, seminar programmes and conferences. There is no doubt that this ‘revolution’ is gaining astonishing momentum in the UK Manufacturing community and is set to become as well established and accessible as lean engineering has since it was first introduced by Toyota in the 1990s. No surprise then that the BFPA Annual Statistics and Economic Seminar in September included a very well received presentation on Industry 4.0 from Dr Lina Huertas, a PhD in the application of informatics solutions at the UK Manufacturing Technology Centre where she is heading the Industry 4.0 initiative and the MTC Manufacturing Informatics Project.

Impact

What is striking about this new approach to manufacturing is the potential that it has with regard to standardisation of inter-machine communications protocol and the implications for increasing efficiency, data management and the very basis for manufacturing technology. However, equally striking, is the fact this new concept is moving so fast that many companies, particularly those in the UK SME sector are not fully appreciative of its potential and the impact that it is going to have on manufacturing as a whole. This is, of-course, worrying as whilst early adopters of any new concept suffer the growing pains associated with its introduction, they ultimately gain significant competitive advantage and it is apparent that German manufacturers and other central European companies are approaching it with far greater receptivity than ourselves in the UK.

As Dr. Huertas explained, the term ‘Industry 4.0’ refers to the fourth industrial revolution. It originates from a project in the high-tech strategy of the German government, which promotes the computerisation of manufacturing. The first industrial revolution was the mechanisation of production using water and steam power. The second industrial revolution then introduced mass production with the help of electric power, followed by the digital revolution and the use of electronics and IT to further automate production.

Ironically, the term Industry 4.0 was first used in 2011 at the above referenced Hanover Fair. In October 2012 the Working Group on Industry 4.0 chaired by Siegfried Dais (Robert Bosch GmbH) and Kagermann (acatech) presented a set of Industry 4.0 implementation recommendations to the German federal government. On 8 April 2013 at the Hanover Fair the final report of the Working Group Industry 4.0 was presented. That is how recent and how fast this concept has developed.

The basic principle of Industry 4.0 is that by connecting machines, work pieces and systems, we are creating intelligent networks along the entire value chain that can control each other autonomously.  Examples of ‘Industry 4.0 compliant machines’ are those that predict failures and trigger maintenance processes autonomously or self-organised logistics that react to unexpected changes in the production.

Greater interconnection

Siegfried Dais is quoted as saying that; “it is highly likely that the world of production will become more and more networked until everything is interlinked with everything else.” While this sounds like a fair assumption and the driving force behind another new concept, the ‘Internet of Things’, it also means that the complexity of production and supplier networks will grow enormously. Networks and processes have so far been limited to one factory. But in an Industry 4.0 scenario, these boundaries of individual factories will most likely no longer exist. Instead, they will be lifted in order to interconnect multiple factories or even geographical regions. 

Along with this super-connectivity comes the spectre of reduced security and as with the introduction of cloud computing, pundits for Industry 4.0 will have address such concerns if the technological benefits are to be fully realised and not hampered by the perception that Intellectual Property is being put at risk.  Dr. Huertas has gone as far as suggesting that manufacturers may be surprised at just how publicly accessible much of their data really is and even if it wasn’t, how minimal the commercial impact might be if it were to become freely available.

One thing is for certain; against this backdrop of intellectual debate and conjecture it is clear that Industry 4.0 is not simply a passing fad.  It is a fundamental new way of thinking about our manufacturing environment and it will have a profound impact upon what will ultimately be our ability to compete. A given company is ‘either in the game or it’s not’ and if the latter is the case such companies may find it harder and harder to compete in a globalised market where resources, materials, quality standards, waste minimisation, interoperability and fast response times are pushed to the very limits of what is possible. In a very few years from now, there will be companies and consultants offering Industry 4.0 consulting services in the same way as there are already in the field of Lean Engineering. Indeed, Dr. Huertas and her colleagues at the UK MTC in Coventry are already happy to take such enquiries. As the saying goes, ‘be there or be square’.