Preparing for 4th industrial revolution

Board of directors at dinner party for intelligent machineries event and members of TAMI

The Industrial Revolution that began in England sometime after the middle of the 18^th century, discovered new sources (steam and coal) as energy power, which radically reduced the human power, was widely used in the spinning mills factory. The emergence of mass production and the changing relationship of human in the factory reshaped the modern life style. The sphere of politics, economics, technology, and even war and conflicts all altered because of the changing experience in everyday life. Following the second industrial revolution, and the third computer revolution, today we have arrived at another critical phase where strong forces once again change the manufacturing sector with AI, IIoT, big data, taking the digitalisation to another level.

The governments across the world designed national plans for the coming of a new era, from the most well-known Industry 4.0 in Germany, Advanced manufacturing in the U.S., Society 5.0 of Japan, to China’s 2025 manufacturing plans, they highlighted the arrival of a new economic model. On The World Economic Forum held in September 2017, it became more certain that the forth industrial revolution creates opportunity for us to innovate and reflect with the forming of a new economic model.

This core value is also the opinion of Mr. C.C. Wang, President of Taiwan Association of Machinery Industry (TAMI). He talks about in the potential evolution of Taiwan’s machineries in the new era, the particular strengths they offer for buyers, and finally TAMI’s role to ensure these developments are operating smoothly.

Implementing “glocalisation” in the manufacturing sector

The term glocalisation is a word that blends global + localisation, meaning the practice of conducting business according to both local and global considerations.

At the start of new year when it is time for many to initiate new strategies regarding the latest smart manufacturing technologies, president Wang reminds the manufacturers that “In the manufacturing sector it is crucial for machine builders to embed their unique strengths in highly globalised manufacturing relations, that include defining their own advantages even in the age of smart production. For example, under the notion of Industry 4.0, there are some universal principles regarding digitalisation and IoT. However, machine builders must stay versatile about applying these technologies, use these principle technologies to further create a more diverse and innovative sector,” Mr Wang emphasised.

Pointing to the SMEs (small and medium enterprises), who takes up over 95% of Taiwan’s business type, the ability to stay glocalised is ever more important today. Intelligent manufacturing will allow companies to achieve production in small batch with high diversity. As modules and machining data could be altered easily once they are stored and systemised, adding customised features will be faster. “This capacity will definitely help Taiwan machine builders level up, by making their competitive edges differ from mass production,” president Wang explained.

Introducing TAMI smart box

In 2018, TAMI plans to launch a new product, called “smart box,” a device that enables companies to build industrial intelligent systems by connecting machines to it.  The smart box is developed in cooperation with the Precision Machinery Development Association, it is like the commonly seen internet box for TVs, but for industrial application. TAMI’s smart box will have the function to connect machines, robots, sensors while collecting statistics at the same time.

This is not a completely new notion, multinational manufacturers like Mazak has similar devices like this. But what is unique in TAMI smart box is that it is more economic; furthermore, it functions as an open-source system that easily connects systems and devices from different suppliers. The motivation for designing TAMI smart box originated from the particular fact that a majority of SMEs face obstacles in adopting Industry 4.0 systems in their shop floor. Many lacks sufficient resources or technology to build a system of their own, others struggle to find feasible long-term strategies. TAMI smart box targets these companies and advocates a simple way to make factory smarter. In addition, there will be a Cloud platform and Machine Cloud that functions multilaterally (similar as MT connect). Services such as educational/technical training lessons can be operated remotely, and facilitated as an exchanging platform between different disciplines and industries.

“We hope that TAMI smart box is the solution for the SMEs on the journey of digitalising, and eventually I envision a future that with the help of standardised service from smart box, producers would later advance with diversified machining features,” president Wang remarked.

2018 outlook: robotics and SI

President Wang is extremely optimistic about the industrial outlook of Taiwan’s machine export in 2018. It will grow at least 10%, culminating from the strong demands in 2017. In 2017 the export value of machineries mounted to US$25 billion, which is a 20% growth compared to the previous year.

Speaking about the potential trends that manufacturers can be aware of, President Wang shared his analysis and suggestion, “I believe there will be a positive performance in the field of Industrial robotics. Over the past two year it has experienced an impressive surge of demands. It grew 60% in Taiwan’s value of export from January to August. Our Asia Pacific neighbours are the top destinations for industrial robots, while China, Korea and Hong Kong remain the top three markets for industrial robots. On the other hand, I see business opportunities in system integration (SI) software. SI software is essential for Industry 4.0 to flourish in the machinery industry, and it is also the key for SMEs to realise a more comprehensive and feasible form of smart manufacturing.”

By gathering resources and knowledge from the metal-working, IT, engineering, design, and other industries, successful SI software could become the heart of the machinery sector – and in the future an export commodity for overseas SMEs. In May 9-12 the trade show iMTduo in Taipei will be displaying systems and machining solutions for smart factory. Buyers who wish to gear up production lines are welcomed to visit and exchange information.