Industry 4.0 is the new era of intelligent enterprises. The future of business will depend heavily on deep data analysis. Dominik Metzger, head of project management, manufacturing and IIoT, SAP, shares how IIoT can be leveraged to provide deep data-driven insights and pathways to operational improvement.
Businesses worldwide are preparing for industry 4.0, buoyed by great expectations of the benefits that the new industrial revolution will bring. Powered by real-time data, automation, and machine learning, industry 4.0 will welcome a new era of intelligent enterprises that are able to make decisions informed by data rapidly.
At the heart of industry 4.0 lies the concept of interconnectivity. Through deep integration, a business’s various technologies will communicate with each other, one helping to inform the other to ultimately offer powerful insights into how the business is performing operationally, as well as uncover actionable paths to achieve greater efficiency.
However, the depth and strength of the insights produced for the business heavily depend on the quality and quantity of the data it collects and how quickly it is shared. Enter the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT)Opens a new window , a connected web of sensors, devices and business applications able to collect and rapidly share a wealth of data to be analyzed.Â
Organizations should go one step further and drive more innovation by investing in IIoT and collecting mass amounts of data into a data lake. To help customers to realize their industry 4.0 projects faster than ever before, we recently kicked off an initiative for a packed approach with partners:
Realizing IoT Scenarios in Short Time The objective of this initiative is to offer a packaged approach for selected focus IoT scenarios jointly with partners. In this way, we want to be able to set up a live demonstrator at the customer site in only a few days only. This approach includes everything a customer needs to start an IIoT project- from hardware, over software and connectivity, to consulting. We’ll cover everything needed to realize the scenario. Afterwards, the live demonstrator can be used productively by the customer. As we look forward to a new era of intelligent enterprises powered by deep data insights, here are three scenarios that will be included:
Also Read Rise of the Digital Twin in Industrial IoT: Here’s What You Should Know
1. Equipment health monitoring and protection
Keeping equipment up and running at full capacity is vital for all businesses. With a deep understanding of how all assets are currently used and their condition, businesses can optimize equipment utilization and ensure they receive proper maintenance before breakdowns occur. Serving the digital eyes and ears of the business, IIoT can monitor and provide a 360-degree view of equipment, gathering model, sensor and transactional data for analysis.
2. Smart replenishment
For businesses moving products, knowing exactly how much is available on shelves and when replenishments are needed is a matter of operational and financial efficiency. Lack of product can leave you stranded and unable to fulfill commitments to customers, while a surplus can incur unnecessary storage costs and lead to a shortfall in cash flow. IIoT can help businesses automatically achieve a balance by keeping the businesses updated on the product in stock and automating the replenishment process.Â
Take, for example, a manufacturing company in the discrete industry. Most likely, the manufacturer will have a Kanban procedure that controls production and material flow based on the material stock. It’s important that the manufacturer has material constantly available, but also kept in small quantities in production.
Here, IIoT sensors can leverage image recognition and scan ID-tags (such as RFID, barcodes and QR codes) attached to shelves and containers to correlate the movement of physical products to specific Kanban steps. The IIoT technology keeps the business informed of the status of product stock levels and automatically triggers replenishment at the warehouse or the supplier when needed. By ensuring the business is always efficient, IIoT can drive down operational costs, reduce manual efforts, minimize human error and improve customer satisfaction by avoiding out-of-stock situations.
Also Read: How 5G Can Open Doors To Vast Technological Improvements for Manufacturing Firms
3. Quality assurance
Ensuring customers receive the best possible quality product is a business imperative. For businesses in industries such as food, pharmaceuticals and chemicals, speed and quality of shipping are especially important as goods are often highly perishable and subject to stringent standards for refrigeration while being transported.Â
With sensors in trucks and shipping containers, businesses can leverage the power of IIoT to monitor transport conditions of deliveries such as temperature, pressure, acceleration and more in real-time. In case of critical situations, IIoT technology can automatically notify the business and trigger a process to replace the delivery. This automation process can not only help reduce operational costs but also improve customer satisfaction as the businesses can assure them that goods are of the highest quality and proactively communicate when planned delivery times are unlikely to be met.Â
Learn More:Â Delivering IoT Connectivity at Scale: Why We Should Care
As we move into industry 4.0, the future of business will undoubtedly rely on the marriage of data collection and analysis. To remain competitive in the new landscape, businesses will need to consider how a IIoT can be leveraged to provide deep data-driven insights and pathways to operational improvement.
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