Automation Is Essential for Manufacturing Growth

Summary

Industrial automation has become increasingly essential for manufacturing companies to grow and prosper. Investments in industrial automation improve overall manufacturing business performance in many areas including:

• Consistent production quality
• Customer service, including product customization
• Reduced variable labor cost
• Solved labor shortages and skills gaps
• Lower energy costs
• Lower production waste.

Industrial automation and controls benefit from technology developed and proven for high-volume commercial and business applications that deliver high performance at lower cost. The evolution of industrial controls and automation has leveraged commercial and business technological developments when they become established and reliable. Past examples include expensive and cumbersome operator workstations custom-built by automation and distributed control system (DCS) suppliers that later gave way to commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) PCs and Microsoft Windows platforms, providing greater value at lower cost and industrial networks running over standard Ethernet.

Automation professionals are becoming increasingly important to create value for their employers by keeping up to date with the latest automation technologies, techniques and solutions to build superior applications.

Automation professionals are important contributors to the competitiveness and overall success of manufacturing companies.The cumulative leverage of applying various new methods and products to improve manufacturing efficiency and quality is significant. Certainly, high visibility and much-hyped new technologies are exciting and important. Yet, the more subtle, seemingly small improvements understood by automation professionals are, over time, just as critical to building success.

Open natural progression

The established industrial automation industry has experienced relatively few changes over the years, compared to other industries. Many of the major industrial automation innovations of the recent past, such as adopting Microsoft Windows, industrial Ethernet networks and application virtualization were accomplished using COTS technology.

The level of usability, flexibility and multivendor interoperability in the business enterprise and information technology (IT) sector is significant. Open systems create ecosystems that leverage human and investment capital to create solutions. These ecosystems can create more value and innovation than any single company.
 

Disruptive innovations

Disruptive innovations create new value so users can achieve better results and, in many cases, more functionality. These innovations may be new applications or may replace traditional methods and solutions. In addition, disruptive innovation can change organizational structure including roles and responsibilities that are not initially obvious.

Amazon, Uber, iTunes and Airbnb are well-known disruptive examples that are not directly related to industrial manufacturing and automation but do illustrate the creative application of technology and new concepts that have dramatically changed commerce.

Industrial examples include the use of hydraulics to replace mechanical methods (i.e., cable, pulley), digital systems to replace pneumatic proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controllers and mechatronics to replace gearboxes and mechanical camming with programmable coordinated motion.

The subtle part of disruptive innovation is that many times it is the combination and creative and innovative application of new off-the-shelf technology to build new and better solutions that result in significant improvements, ease of use and added functions. “The Innovator’s Dilemma” by Clayton Christensen explains how successful companies fail by sticking to their established business models, overlooking disruptive innovations while newer and/or less-established organizations often do otherwise. An example is Kodak, which was slow to fully embrace digital and instead continued to focus on its traditional film business.
 

Competitive success factor

Manufacturing and process companies that do not take advantage of the appropriate disruptive innovations are likely to become uncompetitive at some point and be leapfrogged by their competitors. Conversely, companies that leverage disruptive innovations position themselves to become leaders in their industry. History provides numerous examples of companies using innovative thinking and technology to become industry leaders.

Ford dominated the early automotive industry. More than 100 years ago, Henry Ford and his team at the Highland Park assembly plant launched the world’s first moving assembly line. It simplified the production of the Model T’s 3,000 parts by breaking production into 84 distinct steps performed by groups of workers as a rope pulled the vehicle chassis down the line.

Andrew Carnegie built his steel-making business leveraging technology with new processes such as the Bessemer process. He installed new material-handling systems including overhead cranes and hoists to speed up the steel-making process and boost productivity. Carnegie was relentless in his efforts to drive down costs. He would tear out and replace equipment at his mills if better technology was developed to reduce costs and make his mills more efficient.

Federal Express Corporation, founded in 1971, leveraged barcode and computer technology to achieve dramatic growth. One of FedEx’s great contributions was the tracking system launched in the 1970s, which has become standard in shipping. It was initially an internal process for quality control. When the system went online, it included early prototypes of handheld computers that scanned package barcodes with wands.
 

Looking for insight and innovation

You might think creativity starts with a random idea, but the truth is that the best ideas and new trends don’t arise in an intellectual vacuum. If you want to brainstorm innovations that go beyond solving problems and increasing productivity and performance, you must gather new ideas from multiple sources.

We have been conditioned to believe the only way to get big results is to make a big change. This can sometimes be true, but these opportunities are typically expensive and rare. Many times, the little-change ideas can be as powerful as the big ones. Smaller changes have the advantage of being an additive, instead of an overhaul, and thus may be able to yield big results while being less costly, less risky and less disruptive.
Look to the insights of others and consider macroeconomic trends or technological advances from outside your industry. That’s where the little-change ideas for your operations can be found. 

_{This feature was originally published in AUTOMATION 2024: 9th Annual Industrial Automation & Control Trends Report.}