4.0 Automation technologies, through IIoT (Industrial Internet of Things) connect, control and monitor networks of gadgets, devices, machines, robots, and cloud information in real-time (via Cloud Monitoring). This way it allows them to learn, operate and function automatically, minimizing human intervention and optimizing production.
The introduction of 3D printing or sensors on production lines facilitates and optimizes the production process. Their use provides immediate feedback through the collected and compiled data. Automation, a pillar of Industry 4.0, is measured and verified in terms of time savings from design to machine monitoring.
Visualizing the limits of a project, and anticipating a possible machine failure or a stock shortage is now possible and carried out by the participants in the manufacturing process. In Industry 4.0, intelligent automation systems have a direct impact on development and maintenance. This new industrial mode generates a cost reduction for companies.
How Does IoT Help in Transforming Traditional Production into a Smart Industry?
In a smart factory, the ability to exchange, record, and analyze data without being on the production floor is one of the advantages offered by the use of connected tools. Industry 4.0 uses connected devices. The IoT allows operators to remotely control machines, assess risks or intervene in production.
In Industry 4.0, digital technologies with the use of 3D printing allow an increasingly customized production, without requiring new manufacturing tools, or even their acquisition. It is thus a source of both flexibility and optimization.
This transformation of the industry induced by new manufacturing methods and smart tools or objects brings more flexibility to companies. It offers more responsibility to operators who interact directly with production in more rewarding working conditions.
In this sense, it marks the end of assembly line work as it was known at the beginning of the 20th century. The digitalization of industry requires new skills and new professions that put people at the center of the industrial revolution or Industry 4.0.
Industry 4.0 Has Created a New Generation of Production System
Smart companies can better manage their productivity and manufacturing costs by adapting more quickly to market demand. This industrial revolution:
- completely changes the use of the machine
- optimizes the production cycle
- impacts the technology used in every sector of the industry
From modeling a car to modeling a purse to building a building, Industry 4.0 is revolutionizing work by transforming the way we work.
The software driving the robots or augmented reality allows to simplify and model the devices making their elaboration or modification faster. The industry of the future wants to facilitate. Gaining efficiency at each stage of the manufacturing process to satisfy the end customer is its mantra. Its use applies to the technology of each sector of activity. Considered a source of division when it was first introduced, it now unites all branches of activity, bringing together traditional craftsmen and high-tech companies.
Automation Becomes An Industrial Phenomenon
Automation through robotics is accelerating in all areas of European industry. While there was one unit per 100 employees in 1995, there were 10 units per 100 in 2019. This figure is constantly increasing with the emergence of industry 4.0 and shows how this process will change production cycles and work methods in the company.
Automation concerns all sectors of a chain. It starts with the supply of the production lines by using robots to feed the machines with parts, continues by controlling the processing machines and changing their rhythm according to the orders, and ends with the packaging. The production speed can be modulated as well as the supply to design specific batches. Automation allows the transition from mass production to demand-driven series production.
As far as the production system is concerned, Industry 4. 0 allows for better control by assessing the risks of breakdowns or stock shortages. The industry of the future is written at the rhythm of innovations and improvement of technologies by creating the new factory of tomorrow. Smart factories are the wave of the future. Smart factories will be intelligent and automated factories, where machines are networked with each other, able to diagnose and solve problems by collecting and analyzing big data in real-time.
