February, 2016
www.us-tech.com Is 2016 the Year of IoT? By Philip Stoten (@philipstoten) T
he first industrial revolution was built on machines lubricat- ed by oil. The current revolu-
tion is built on computers lubricated by data, and just as those who con- trolled the sources and distribution of oil became rich and powerful in the last millennium, those controlling data are gaining influence now. With data as the valuable re-
source, what will its greatest impact be on your business and how can you make sure you’re a “data have” rather than a “data have-not”? Let’s start with data on the
shop floor, your own data, the data that helps you manage your process- es and your business. The battle for control of that data is already under- way with numerous players in the in- dustry claiming to be the right data managers or aggregators. Vendors of machine to machine (M2M) software, MES (Manufacturing Execution Sys- tem) software, ERP (Enterprise Re- source Planning) software and much more are drawing up the lines of combat for dominance in this space. The battle is by no means restricted to those in the software arena either with hardware vendors doing their best to be systems providers or line providers, offering smart solutions for the factory floor. The first industry event focused
on IoT in the electronic manufactur- ing space will take place on February 16 in San Jose, California. Called IoM2016 (
www.internetofmanufac-
turing.com) it already has the sup- port of ASM, Mentor, Riverwood So- lutions and Jabil and expects to have speakers from up and down the elec-
dustry 4.0 and offer real value. Beyond the four walls of the fac-
tory, data has yet more to offer. Smart factories need to be connected to smart supply chains, which re- spond to demand and influence man- ufacturing as supply chain disrup- tion occurs. Creating an intelligent supply chain can have a huge impact upon any business, driving costs and inventory down, efficiency and cus- tomer satisfaction up and accelerat-
ing time to market. What we’re all looking for is a smart solution that connects the online ordering process all the way through the fulfilment process to the eventual delivery of the product and beyond. For me, one of the key benefits
of IoT is the potential to utilize crowd-sourced data to improve processes, decisions and, as a result, outcomes. The idea that each ma- chine, system, line, factory and sup-
ply chain can provide data anony- mously to the cloud is hugely attrac- tive. Crowd sourced data could, for example, tell you which solder paste works best, on which product, in which oven, based on the experience of thousands of examples. It could provide benchmarked data on line performance and could help improve yields and performance throughout the fulfilment process.
Continued on page 44
Page 21
Philip Stoten is an internation- ally recognized EMS industry expert. Known for his skills as an inter viewer, reporter and
panel moderator, Philip is a fea- tured multi-media contributor to U.S. Tech on a regular basis.
tronics supply chain. It is expected to focus discussion on how best to im- plement IoT or Industry 4.0 solutions in the electronics manufacturing space.
Add in the possibilities around
ML (Machine Learning), AI (Artifi- cial Intelligence) using contextual computing and AR (Augmented Real- ity) and you can envision a heady mix that revolutionizes the way we operate the manufacturing environ- ment and the supply chain beyond. Learning systems, closed loops or cy- ber physical systems are key to In-
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72 |
Page 73 |
Page 74 |
Page 75 |
Page 76 |
Page 77 |
Page 78 |
Page 79 |
Page 80 |
Page 81 |
Page 82 |
Page 83 |
Page 84 |
Page 85 |
Page 86 |
Page 87 |
Page 88 |
Page 89 |
Page 90 |
Page 91 |
Page 92 |
Page 93 |
Page 94 |
Page 95 |
Page 96