You can call it smart industry, Smart Factory, Industry 4.0 or whatever you like. What is important is the shift in perspective and the benefits it brings. On the one hand, needs are identified and demand is growing; while on the other, technology becomes available and increasingly accessible, including: automation, robots and cobots, virtualisation, IoT and IIoT, Artificial Intelligence, digital and operational integration and so on and so forth.
This huge number of alternatives and the speed at which they are being developed globally means very few companies have in-house resources to implement all this knowledge within a reasonable timescale. Therefore, collaboration – whether with external experts, customers, suppliers or even competitors – is the key ingredient for a rapid and successful transition to smart industry.
Is it possible to achieve the transition to smart industry alone?
It is difficult, if not impossible, to make this journey alone. Collaboration is vital in the digital era, even more so in this new industrial revolution brought about by the convergence of different technologies. It is the contribution from multiple stakeholders that can unleash the full potential of innovation.
The time of having our own solution to all problems is long gone.
The avalanche of new technologies available today has caused the industry to undergo a profound transformation. This change, which goes beyond specific sectors or niches, offers us with a new industrial ecosystem which is much more dynamic, permeable and cooperative, where relationships are crucial to survival.
Companies can benefit from working with specialised partners who can offer them new technologies that they would never have accessed to on their own. Because this is what it is all about, establishing long-term relationships beyond the traditional customer-supplier model, with partners with whom we may not have been able to count on until now.
This can make a difference in the transition to more productive, sustainable and higher quality industrial activity, but it requires the adoption of collaborative business models, which force a change of mindset. Organisations need to be more transparent, more permeable and oriented not only to their own benefit, but to the benefit of both parties.
These are some of the key elements to achieve successful smart industry relations through collaboration:
- Adopt a new culture of collaboration that involves the whole organisation;
- Implement and share clear planning;
- Support the implementation of international standards.
Collaborative culture as part of the company’s DNA
This idea of collaboration must be understood as something deep within businesses. New times call for new paradigms, and now we need to open up to the outside world in order to be more flexible, dynamic and competitive. But for that to happen, it should reach all levels of the company, starting with management. The co-operative culture requires leaders to be aware of this need and to makes it dynamic within the global scenario where we operate.
Development and innovation must be shared between industries working collaboratively.
To benefit from these processes, companies need to be open to other sources of knowledge, to explore this information and to transform their reality in order to take advantage of its benefits. For this to happen, the work structure and processes need to facilitate it, an open mindset to work beyond the company walls must be in place, transparency and communication, allocation of resources and, in short, a strong collaborative culture are a must.
Visualise, plan, collaborate
Companies do not need to be experts in all new technologies. It is simply not feasible. But they must have a clear aim to work towards, which will determine what kind of technologies and therefore collaborations are most necessary and rewarding for them.
Lacking such a roadmap takes its toll. Day-to-day activity dictates the pace of business, making it difficult to implement major breakthroughs by allocating resources to urgent rather than important issues (such as innovation and transformation). A lack of strategy only leaves room for trial-and-error improvements, which represents a major waste of time and resources in most cases.
However, having a clear roadmap facilitates decision-making, prioritising actions and choosing the right partners who are aligned with your objectives. This collaboration between companies helps to boost innovation projects, accelerate the development and launching of new products and facilitate actual business progress.
Implementation of international standards, created by and for industry collaboration
All experts support the idea that collective efforts achieve better results. In this context, international standards can be one of the best «levers» for collaboration: they are born from the collaborative effort between international bodies and their purpose is to facilitate joint work of an entire sector.
Reaching global agreements on terminology, reference models, levels of transparency, etc. makes it easier for more bodies to join this industrial revolution, improving the integration of technologies and interoperability between players, thus fostering a virtuous circle that benefits the entire industrial sector.
The emergence of solutions under the platform model also facilitates the implementation of standards.
One way to achieve this is by playing an active role in helping to define new international standards that companies then can internalise and apply both internally and with their suppliers. Standards aim to develop and boost certain processes and technologies to be more easily adopted by industry and provide flexibility and scalability.
Another way is to support the adoption of existing standards (as not all bodies have the possibility to actively participate in the definition of standards). Adopting standards that are supported by the industry always leads to generating more synergies and scalability, as opposed to developing hyper-customised alternatives.
Not all current technologies have standards, so there is still some way to go. It would facilitate cross-industry collaboration, unifying standards and simplifying data exchange, improving information security and privacy systems, and reducing costs while improving competitiveness.
In this respect, the emergence of solutions under the platform model also facilitates the implementation of standards, as they offer access to new technologies taking into account the latest international standards. Platforms such as MIC by SMARTPM provide a common ground on which each company can develop customised solutions tailored to its own needs.
A reliable partner for your machining processes
This is no time to be afraid to collaborate. Experience has shown us that together we go further and faster. Collaboration means growth, access to new resources, agility, productivity and flexibility. In short, becoming a smarter industry.
At SMARTPM we do not see companies as isolated islands, we would rather commit to build relationships based on trust. We want to share our vision of what we understand by industry with our partners and overcome the new challenges together.
If you are in the machining sector, our innovation award-winning MIC platform offers you all our knowledge of processes and metrology, asset connectivity, workflow design and control, and productivity improvement through predictive analysis, machine learning and autonomous cell management.
We have the technology, the know-how and the experience – everything you need to transform your workshop. Together we will go further.
Header photo: Daniel Funes Fuentes – unsplash
