In today’s rapidly evolving technological landscape, artificial intelligence (AI) is becoming increasingly crucial for the manufacturing industry. By addressing critical data challenges, enhancing workforce capabilities, and leveraging advanced AI technologies, manufacturers can navigate current and future obstacles effectively, achieving greater efficiencies and competitiveness.
Solving Data Challenges
One of the biggest hurdles in manufacturing is managing and utilizing data effectively. To harness the full potential of AI, manufacturers must ensure data readiness and richness. AI can transition from information to knowledge and wisdom, but it needs well-integrated and comprehensive data to provide actionable insights. This is where the concept of a digital twin becomes vital.
According to McKinsey & Company
“Digital Twins—reusable virtual representations of assets, people, or processes and their environments that simulate strategies and optimize behaviors—are a powerful tool that can help organizations improve data-backed decision making.”
A complete digital twin allows AI to see the full context of operations and accurately answer questions or take actions.
Tim Burke, CTO & Co-Founder of Arch Systems, says it this way :
“Without a digital twin, an AI is not fully informed–it only sees the data it is given–revealing the data dilemma.”
Enhancing Workforce Capabilities
The manufacturing industry is currently facing a severe talent shortage, projected to double by 2030. This skill gap is further amplified by onshoring efforts. AI can play a crucial role in addressing this issue by upskilling less experienced workers and improving productivity.
Paul Baldassari, President of Manufacturing and Services at FLEX, explains:
“You need to empower the people on the shopfloor to come to the right conclusions. AI plays a very important role [in taking] the vast data that’s available on the shopfloor and [transforming] it into information that people can make fast decisions on…”
AI can act as a co-pilot, enabling employees with less training to accomplish more with guided intelligent actions. The goal is not to eliminate jobs but to enhance human capabilities and productivity through AI co-piloting.
Leveraging AI for Future Factories
AI has the potential to automate problem-solving and management tasks, not just physical assembly tasks. By leveraging a comprehensive digital twin, AI can capture both documented and undocumented knowledge, providing invaluable support to factory leaders.
In a recent post, McKinsey & Company explained:
“With stores of robust, contextualized data, digital twins provide a secure environment in which gen AI can ‘learn’ and broaden the scope of prompts and output.”
This automation extends beyond the factory floor to top-floor decision-makers and strategists. Equipped with AI-enhanced intelligence, global manufacturing leaders can make critical decisions necessary to stay competitive in a rapidly changing market.
As Tim Burke presented:
AI should now automate problem solving & management of the factory, not just direct automation of assembly tasks.
The Skills Gap
Manufacturers today are navigating a landscape filled with supply chain disruptions and skilled worker shortages. Global manufacturing output is growing by a trillion dollars per year, and there is a shift towards regionalizing manufacturing, leading to more onshoring. According to a study by Deloitte and The Manufacturing Institute, the manufacturing skills gap in the U.S. could result in 2.1 million unfilled jobs by 2030. The same study notes that 77% of manufacturers say they will have ongoing difficulties in attracting and retaining workers.
Paul Baldassari noted that:
“Each year we have to do roughly 10% more activities… but we have to do it with the same number of people because the labor market…is limited.”
The disparity between available skilled workers and jobs that need to be filled is even more dire on the world stage. In a recent report from the World Economic Forum it was estimated that there are over 10 million unfilled manufacturing jobs with that gap expected only to grow wider.
Bridging the Gap via AI
To address these challenges, manufacturers must establish a robust AI strategy. This involves building a comprehensive digital twin along with a unified data model to standardize data from various systems like ERP, MES, and PLM.
Digital twins provide a single source of truth that enhances visibility and enables more informed decision-making. This approach alone has been shown to uncover bottlenecks, optimize production sequences, and ultimately improve efficiency and reduce costs (McKinsey & Company).
In addition, the rich, contextualized, real-time data generated from a Unified Data Model that feeds the digital twin, becomes the primary input source for enabling the generative AI required to bridge the skills gap and ensure sustainable growth.
By leveraging advanced data techniques and deep manufacturing expertise, manufacturers can transform the data that already exists on their factory floors into meaningful insights with AI-guided actions that lead to operational improvements.
The goal is to enable future factories where people can become new experts earlier in their careers and with less training. AI enhances opportunities, accelerates training, and increases productivity by institutionalizing knowledge and making it transferable. Root-cause problem-solving is automated, freeing people for greater productivity in other areas.
Conclusion
AI in manufacturing transcends mere technology adoption; it represents a fundamental transformation of the entire operation. By overcoming data challenges, upskilling the workforce, and harnessing AI for automation, manufacturers can significantly boost efficiency and maintain a competitive edge in today’s dynamic market.
Embrace the journey from data to insight to action with ArchFX AI, and revolutionize your manufacturing processes to achieve unparalleled growth and innovation.
How can your manufacturing operations benefit from AI integration?
Reach out to Arch Systems today to explore the possibilities and start your transformation journey.