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The 4th Industrial Revolution is a
highly discussed topic and it gained
even more attention when it became
the focus of discussions at the World
Economic Forum’s Annual Meeting
in 2016. Industry 4.0 has brought
and continues to bring fundamental
changes to manufacturing, which
some welcome, some fear.
Those who welcome it see
the potential in the technical
advancements which Industry 4.0
holds. The factories which have been
improved with the latest technology
are called smart factories. The
components of these factories are
connected and together they create
a web of information and production,
the so-called Industrial Internet of
Things. A perfect example is the
Siemens (IW 1000/34) Electronic
Works facility in Amberg, Germany.
The 108,000-square-foot high-tech
facility is adequate for a built-to-
order process involving more than
1.6 billion components.
An advanced factory like this
improves manufacturing processes
in numerous ways compared to
traditional factories. In a summary
from
RobotWorx,
decreased
production costs by shorter cycle
times (among others) and improved
quality and reliability are named first.
They also emphasize the advantage
of better floor space utilization
which is possible by decreasing a
footprint of a work area. By reducing
the factor of human mistakes one
can calculate with reduced waste as
well. It is also important to highlight
the increase of safety since human
workers are moved to supervisory
roles where they no longer have to
perform dangerous applications in
hazardous settings. And last but not
lease adaptability is also a key factor
for success and robots and AI are
suitable for performing a variety of
applications.
It is also very important to emphasize
that having a smart factory has
became affordable: there are
agile factory robots for as little as
$25,000 already, which is financially
equivalent to paying a full-time
human worker $4 an hour over the
life of the machine.
As a proof of the previously
mentioned advantages, the Siemens
Work facility only records about 15
defects per million and has shown
a 99% reliability rate and 100%
Industry 4.0 Let’s look at the big picture
Molly Connell, TradeMachines
38 l New-Tech Magazine Europe