Manufacturers are constantly on the outlook for new opportunities and efficiencies that could manage new operations and serve customers in better manner. Manufacturing industry trends for 2018 are focused around delivering high productivity in limited time. However, these expectations are often conflicted with challenges of managing legacy systems, having a viable workforce and handling large volumes of data.
These concerns have direct impact on key operational areas and the effectiveness with which manufacturers take advantage of technology trends. Advancements in technology have gone a long way to address challenges of manufacturing industry by redefining the workflow of operations.
Anticipating the growth and usefulness of top emerging technologies for business, experts predict top manufacturing industry trends for 2018:
AI Transformation
Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence (AI) are transforming the way manufacturing industry collects information, manages skilled labor and predicts consumer behavior. These technologies lead the race of manufacturing industry trends 2018. By intelligently determining factors influencing service and production quality, manufacturers are improvising the overall productivity without any compromise on quality.
Integrating manufacturing company systems with AI and IoT allows in automating majority of operations on both sides of the supply chain. Using AI in your existing system would be one time investment, which has the potential to give returns in form of lower cost of production, quicker turnarounds and meeting customer demand.
IoT Revolution
Internet of Things simplifies manufacturing processes by revolutionizing the processes and streamlining them for effective output. Manufacturers also look forward to taking help of IoT to get real-time feedback and give alert to companies about defects or damaged goods.
Experts predict that 2018 would see in-depth penetration of IoT in manufacturing systems where almost all operations interlinked with each other would communicate remotely in an integrated ecosystem. Such implementations of IoT result in higher productivity at reduced costs.
Industrial Automation with IIoT
Manufacturing industry goes a step further in automation with efficient utilization of low-cost sensors and advanced connectivity. Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) is expected to take giant strides in manufacturing domain. Integration of smart devices, systems and software across operations at different levels in a logical manner is made possible with IIoT.
The environment created by IIoT enables manufacturers to seamlessly communicate with other machines, manage equipment, log stats and detect performance related problems. As per manufacturing industry trends of 2018, it would see rise in use of IIoT technology to accelerate productivity and reduce operational costs.
Robots
2018 would mark the infiltration of robots in manufacturing to an extent where experts fear that robots could replace humans in this domain. Automation and robotics enables manufacturers to achieve high level of precision and productivity, which is much beyond the ability of humans, particularly in hazardous environments.
The technologies for image and voice recognitions have empowered robots to duplicate complex human tasks with high accuracy. Replacing humans with robots is nearing in 2018 where all tedious tasks are automated, thereby saving resources for more fruitful work. Let’s hope that this manufacturing industry trend of 2018 help in reducing workload with automated processes.
Big Data to Become Bigger
As experts predict, digitization in manufacturing is bound to increase data to nearly 10 times. Organizing and managing such large amount of data is often a problem. Manufacturers look at Big Data as a promising technology that would be put to use in 2018 at maximum level to systematically arrange all consumer and product information.
Related Post: Importance of Big Data
On a Concluding Note…
Manufacturing industry has vast scope for absorbing technology that can help in reducing workload of employees, increase speed of productivity and improve overall efficiency. Manufacturing industry trends 2018 are a clear indication that technology based operations would come to forefront.
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