Rockwell Automation Shian: Intelligent manufacturing is not the superposition of software and hardware technologies

Rockwell Automation Shian: Intelligent manufacturing is not the superposition of software and hardware technologies

(Shanghai, China, December 17, 2021) On December 10, the 2021 World Intelligent Manufacturing Conference was successfully concluded in Nanjing, Jiangsu. An Shi, President of Rockwell Automation (China) Co., Ltd., was invited to attend the opening ceremony and participate in the International Intelligent Manufacturing Ecological Cooperation Summit Forum. He delivered a keynote speech on "Disruption: Digital Reshaping of the Industrial Ecological Value Chain" on how to develop a healthy intelligent manufacturing ecosystem. In his speech, An Shi shared Rockwell Automation's successful cases of using digital technology to subvert business models, and looked forward to working with strategic partners to jointly build a healthy intelligent manufacturing industry ecological value chain and move towards a new era of digital civilization.

The World Intelligent Manufacturing Conference has been successfully held in Nanjing for five sessions. The International Intelligent Manufacturing Ecological Cooperation Forum was hosted by the World Intelligent Manufacturing Conference, organized by the International Intelligent Manufacturing Alliance, the China Association for Science and Technology Intelligent Manufacturing Society Consortium, and the Chinese Society of Mechanical Engineers, and jointly implemented by Huazhong University of Science and Technology and e-works Digital Enterprise Network. More than 80 guests, including experts, scholars, entrepreneurs, and technical backbones from the field of intelligent manufacturing, participated in this event.

Digital drives the transformation of the industrial ecosystem value chain

The digital economy has injected strong impetus into the high-quality development of the manufacturing industry, but looking at the world, digital value is not always effectively demonstrated, and the value behind the smart manufacturing ecosystem is often easily overlooked. According to a survey by Boston Consulting Group (BCG), around the world, about 70% of digitally transformed companies have not yet achieved their expected digital transformation goals.

Shi An said that in the past, the criteria for judging the manufacturing industry only needed to focus on "cost", "quality" and "delivery". Now, even with the addition of "technology" and "service", it is far from enough. Whether digital technology can bring about green growth is one of the criteria for evaluating whether a company has successfully transformed.

“The disconnect between people, processes and strategies is the main reason for the failure of digital transformation of enterprises. Is the strategy ahead of industry trends? Is it integrated with industry trends? Or has the integration failed?” Shi An proposed several hypotheses on the failure of digital transformation of enterprises, indicating that if enterprises want to successfully achieve digital transformation, they need to start from the overall situation, not only think big, but also start small and replicate quickly to subvert business models and enhance the core competitiveness of enterprises.

Saving money and increasing revenue to disrupt business models

For traditional manufacturing, homogeneous competition and overcapacity are the main factors hindering the development of the industry. In Shi An's view, empowering the industry with digital technology can bring three dimensions of value, namely cost saving, source opening and subversion.

Among them, cost-saving aims to achieve continuous optimization of enterprise operations, business innovation, and maximization of asset value through data intelligence and industrial collaboration, and to achieve safe, energy-saving, environmentally friendly, and efficient development at the industry level. The goal of open source is cross-border integration. Relying on the integration and innovation of IT/OT, digital technology can help enterprises achieve cross-border integration in this dimension, break through the bottleneck of traditional manufacturing, and achieve sustainable development of the industry.

Rockwell Automation integrates the sustainable development SEEE values ​​of safety, energy saving, environmental protection, and efficiency into intelligent manufacturing, and deeply collaborates with the industry through a century of automation, digitalization, and intelligent innovation technologies to achieve business innovation and enterprise operation optimization, ultimately achieving the transition from cost saving to open source, and accelerating the formation of production methods, industrial forms, and business models that conform to the new era of digital civilization, promoting the high-quality development of China's manufacturing industry.

Join hands with partners to create a digital future

More and more manufacturing companies are looking forward to taking the digital express train and accelerating their progress into Industry 4.0. Shi An emphasized that the key to change is not the superposition of software and hardware technologies. Open compatibility, continuous expansion, and autonomous control are the three key capabilities of digital transformation, and are also issues that smart manufacturing companies need to focus on.

The intelligent operation and maintenance Rockii solution, supported by innovative technologies such as industrial Internet of Things, big data, artificial intelligence, AR/VR, and digital twins, is a future-oriented, industry-end-to-end digital transformation platform created by Rockwell Automation. It fully covers the three-layer architecture of SaaS, PaaS, and IaaS for cloud services, and has the characteristics of openness, compatibility, and sustainable expansion. It helps customers form the ability to quickly develop and deliver products, supports enterprises to independently control, develop, and verify, redefine value creation, and achieve value increment.

The intelligent operation and maintenance Rockii solution has been widely recognized by customers and the industry since its launch. Nanjing Puyuan Ice Cream Machinery Co., Ltd. (referred to as "Nanjing Puyuan") is one of the leading companies in the field of ice cream manufacturing equipment in China. Relying on the intelligent operation and maintenance Rockii solution, it has built an industry-leading digital lighthouse factory, upgraded OT operation technology with the help of IT communication technology, and built an intelligent production line. This production line is not only China's first fully automatic Rockii intelligent ice cream production line from grouting to delivery, but also the only fully automatic Rockii intelligent 3D ice cream production line in China. After the digital upgrade, Nanjing Puyuan saved 90% of labor costs*, reduced waste emissions by 122 tons/year*, and increased production capacity by 30%+[* Peak value calculated based on different processes]*.

More importantly, Nanjing Puyuan has changed its previous business model that focused on equipment and production lines, shifting from OEM (original equipment manufacturer) to ODM (original design manufacturer), becoming the only fully automated and intelligent ice cream manufacturer in China. While achieving a leapfrog growth in turnover, it has also set a benchmark for the ice cream industry to further accelerate internal circulation and promote industrial transformation and upgrading. Rockwell Automation's digital empowerment has successfully helped Nanjing Puyuan be selected as one of Forbes China's "Top Ten Industrial Digital Transformation Companies in China in 2021", demonstrating Rockwell Automation's innovative advantages in empowering traditional manufacturing and building a new digital-driven industrial ecosystem.

The same disruptive innovation also happened to Tyson Foods, a leading brand in the global protein market. Through the intelligent operation and maintenance Rockii solution, Tyson Foods has connected the three major industries from agriculture to industry to consumer goods, realized the industrial closed loop from breeding to production, packaging, logistics, and sales, built a two-way traceability system from farm to table, from products to raw materials, and created an agile, intelligent, efficient, and low-carbon supply chain. It has truly realized the transformation of the business model from To B to To C, and provided a reference for reshaping the industrial ecological value chain and accelerating the digital upgrade of the industry.

Today, more and more companies are enhancing their value and competitiveness through Rockwell Automation's digital solutions. About 95% of Fortune 100 industrial companies use products and solutions from Rockwell Automation and its partners, 95% of the top 100 life science companies choose Rockwell Automation, and more than 80% of the world's top 100 food companies have Rockwell Automation providing technical support... Rockwell Automation looks forward to working with upstream and downstream partners in the industry to jointly create a mutually beneficial and win-win smart manufacturing ecosystem.