TE Share | Uncovering the four prerequisites and three benefits of smart factories

We hope that change will come soon, but Rome was never built in one day. To complete the transformation from traditional factories to smart factories, it still requires great efforts. First of all, it needs to meet four strict prerequisites.

When it comes to standardization, it is really a double-edged sword! On the one hand, standards need to achieve the professional development of methods and ensure interoperability between machines; on the other hand, as far as the current situation is concerned, it takes a certain amount of time to determine and establish standards, and this delay may reduce the speed of standard adoption. In other words, the standards generated under the time difference may sometimes be inconsistent with the further developed technology, which in turn inhibits the development of intelligence.

However, a standard that is widely recognized by the industry is still necessary to provide manufacturers with clear directions and avoid duplicating useless work.

Smart connectivity provides simple and convenient interconnection solutions for various devices and machines. Generally speaking, the building blocks of smart connectivity include sensing and connectivity. Sensors create the digital nervous system, while connectivity enables networked inputs. These networked inputs are digital inputs transmitted to the network or cloud, which must be integrated with machines and operations to support employees, processes and systems to achieve the goal of improved decision making. In today's industrial environment, many machines are not connected to each other, so information cannot be passed.

To fully benefit from using IoT in production, manufacturers need to enhance the sensing capabilities within machines and open up all data so that this chaotic data can be tied together for analysis.

When it comes to big data, cloud computing and the Internet of Things, we are often concerned about the security of machines and data. For example, hackers have taken control of self-driving cars and remotely controlled the acceleration or braking of the vehicle. Many frightening cases have made engineers pay more attention to network security protection , and are also planning to establish legislation related to data protection, especially information such as data holders and data transmission and management methods.

小规模投资带来的显著回报有助于大规模改进 M2M通讯的长期投入和发展。在工业环境下，“小而美”的智能工厂反而能得到更高的投资回报率。传统工厂转型为智能工厂需要配备全新的基础设施、连接能力、云端和分析工具，成本极为高昂。通过开展可快速产生所需质量、预期成果和显著投资回报率的小规模计划，工程师可以一步一个脚印，慢慢的建成智能工厂这个“罗马帝国”。

Having said so much, do you want to know what practical benefits TE Jun strongly recommends for the transformation of the IoT smart factory? Read on!

First, once it is on the right track, the Internet of Things can help factories save a lot of costs . The gains in operational efficiency account for the majority of cost savings, and as the adoption, stabilization and large-scale prevalence of connected machines, the cost of factory transformation (adoption and implementation) will also decrease. By then, machines that can "communicate with each other" will help you save a lot of time and money with exponential work efficiency.

Secondly, collecting operational data helps understand possible problems within the factory. For example, by more closely tracking the entire production cycle of a product through data, manufacturers can understand the actual cost of manufacturing each individual device and set more accurate prices. With this "real-time monitoring", the cloud will provide users with performance information including when the product may fail, so that they can predict and replace the product in time before the failure occurs. Such nearly transparent data recording and analysis can effectively foresee problems and prevent them before they occur.

Finally, using IoT-connected machines can help save energy . By connecting all machines, we can measure the amount of time they need to run in certain operating states: this means that, based on the data transmitted by the machine network in the connected factory, each machine can only run when necessary, avoiding energy waste. In addition, if a machine encounters a fault and stops, other machines can respond immediately and then reduce production speed or change the production process according to the needs and programmed solutions.

With the development of technology, the Internet of Things is challenging traditional industries. The arrival of a new industrial revolution is never a bad thing. After all, what we have been thinking about is how to make our lives and production more convenient, and the Internet of Things will be the next wave to change our existing production.