Industry 4.0 divulges some influential emergent fluxes with strong
prospective to change the approach in the working of industries.
Whether or not it is an industrial revolution but there are definitely going to be
drastic changes which the industry owners should be aware of the imminent changes
and develop strategies to benefit from this newest opportunity.
It denotes a concept in the existing manufacturing industry which
emphases on the automation of processes and data exchange.
The initiative assimilates the Internet of Things
or IoT, cloud computing and cyber-enhanced systems.
The origin of Industry 4.0 is from a German government
project that supports computerization of manufacturing.
The actual term used by the Working Group
Industry was “Industrie 4.0” in October 2012.
They presented a set of implementation recommendations to the German
government in a final report in the Hanover Fair on April 8, 2013.
The history behind Industry 4.0
There are three more stages of Industry and without
them Industry 4.0 wouldn’t have been possible:
The first was the introduction of machines and mechanization of work
with the help of steam engines and other water powered machinery.
The next revolution came with the discovery of electricity.
The machine were electrified which helped in increased production at factories.
The third revolution is what we can term as Digital Revolution.
Computers and robots made our lives easier.
The fourth one is Industry 4.0 where computer system equipped with
machine learning algorithms will control the robotics connected to it.
Human input will be limited and they will take decisions themselves.
The 4 main design principles of Industry 4.0
Interoperability - The ability of machines, sensors, devices and people to
connect and communicate amongst themselves through the Internet of Things.
Information Transparency - The ability of information systems to form a virtual
copy of the physical world by elevating digital plant models with sensor data.
This necessitates the accumulation of raw sensor
data to higher-value context information.
Technical Assistance – There are two parts to this.
The first, is the ability of support systems
to assist people by amassing and envisaging
information logically to make conversant
decisions and solve vital problems immediately.
Second, the ability of cyber-physical systems to
bodily support people by performing different
types of work that are hostile, too fatiguing, or hazardous for their human associates.
Decentralized Decisions – This principle talks
about ability of cyber-physical systems to make
decisions on their own and to execute their
responsibilities as independently as possible.
Only in case of exemptions, intrusions, or contradictory
objectives, responsibilities are given to a higher level.
Value of Industry 4.0
Recent reports of world famous KPMG say that the component markets of Industry
4.0 have been estimated to be more than $4 trillion by the year 2020.
The value is more than the expected value of Internet of Things
market which has been estimated at $3.7 trillion by 2020, by Gartner.
Once Industry 4.0 is utilized the benefit will be in billions not
to forget thousands of job opportunities that will be created.