Also known as the fourth industrial revolution
Industry 4.0 is transforming manufacturing and impacting how supply chains are managed. This new operating model will provide a bigger competitive advantage via greater productivity and more agility and speed.
Industry 4.0 is the convergence of the physical and digital worlds.
Automation of the supply chain will be needed to cope with the rising demand for smaller deliveries with a higher frequency of deliveries. Deliveries that are on demand, meaning ordered before 2pm delivered same day before 10pm. Supply chains will need to be agile and flexible enough to adapt quickly to the changing market needs as well as changing customer needs.
Under 4.0 and IoT everyday more and more devices and systems are being connected, moving from wired analogue formats to wireless digital ones.
Clearly businesses that adopt 4.0 will have very different starting points, but the bottom line is “start you will”, whether today or tomorrow. In order to compete an understanding of 4.0 and how it will affect your business is required.
These 4 simple questions are a good place to start:
- What is Industry 4.0 and how can it benefit what we do?
- Where do we start?
- What are the gaps today?
- What are the opportunities for tomorrow?
WGL2 (What good looks like) audits, and baseline analysis is a great way to start.