The Growth and Expansion of the Smart Factory

In an age of digital transformation, manufacturers are working to turn their facilities into “smart” factories. The goal of a smart factory is to eliminate all downtime and instead produce perfection in quality and efficiency.

With the world moving faster and technology getting better each year, companies have two decisions – fail to meet consumer needs, or seek new manufacturing solutions. According to an article in Forbes, manufacturing companies are expected to invest $267 billion in IIoT technologies by the year 2020 to support crucial, real-time production decisions. The purposes of these IIoT technologies are to improve product quality, reduce production time and decrease production costs in the long run. While most companies plan to invest in these digital strategies in some way, there are many different types of technologies that can help manufacturers boost productivity. Thus, there is no specific path to the smart factory.

When manufacturers invest in digital solutions, regardless of the type or complexity level, they essentially adopt a data-driven approach to production. This is important because with precise, actionable data, manufacturers can make strategic decisions to help increase quality and uptime while simplifying the process. Connected tools are one way manufacturers can develop this data-driven approach and pave their way to a smarter factory.

Smart solutions like the Ingersoll Rand® INSIGHTqc™ controller provide simple insights to make the manufacturing process fast and more accurate than ever before. The controller collects up to 50,000 records of cycle data and tightening traces for critical assembly manufacturing applications that require advanced fastening strategies. With this, manufacturers can now analyze the data, implement changes and transform their factories to increase productivity and save time.

By utilizing the power of connected tools, manufacturers can spend more time making strategic decisions to grow their business. The actionable insights help manufacturers produce better products with less effort, and contribute to the expansion of digitization in the manufacturing industry.