Over last few years, the world is increasingly making use of technologies in diverse fields. Products and services are being offered in innovative new platforms which are more efficient and integrated. At the same time, technological advancements are leading to reorganization of delivery of societal goods like education, healthcare, and infrastructure as well as functioning of institutions and even government(s).
All of these directly impact both the country’s economy and the shop floor of a manufacturing company. To tackle these paradigm shifts in the global economy, manufacturing companies need to bolster their capabilities and couple their comparative advantage emanating from ‘low cost’ with being ‘precise’, ‘efficient’, ‘agile’ and ‘intelligent’.
Imperative for success in this new world order of fiercely competitive markets will be creating products tailored to the specifications of individual customers, globalized value chains, shorter product lifecycles, better quality, greater flexibility and shorter time to market.
The current trend of automation and data exchange in manufacturing technologies – makes all this possible and is being heralded as intrinsic to the ‘Fourth Industrial Revolution’. It is shaking up manufacturing structures, disrupting traditional value chains and revolutionising economic structures across the world.
Globally this trend is known by many names. In Germany it is known as Industrie 4.0 and in USA it is known as Smart Manufacturing. Several other countries such as Japan, Sweden, South Korea, China have also initiated programmes to help create awareness on the tenets of these technologies and benefits of deploying these solutions.
India can play a leadership role through proactive policies in innovating, evolving and shaping the next global technology- led industrial revolution. India enjoys the advantages of a huge and growing market, a large workforce with diverse skills, and a dynamic entrepreneurial class.
Already, India has emerged as a preferred choice for R&D as over 1000 top global MNCs have set up R&D centers in the country. The third largest technology start-up base, Indian companies are delivering on big data and enterprise risk management.
Source: CII Mission Manufacturing 2017