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2021: The beginning of the future for industry
Author : Mark Yeeles, VP of Industrial Automation at Schneider Electric
10 December 2020
Throughout 2020, every business has found itself at a crossroads, needing to save costs while increasing capacity and robustness. To achieve this, there is one single solution: digitisation. While this is not new to business, over the coming year, we will see digital transformation come into its own.
Transformation will pay dividends for companies that adopted a digital strategy early. For the slow to adopt, 2021 be a year for change to meet future crises and restrictions.
Optimising the dispersed workforce
Remote connectivity and monitoring enable improved agility, safer working conditions and higher levels of security. In the wake of the pandemic’s initial impact on industry, we’ve seeing a sharp rise in the dependence on remote management technologies. With isolating and social distancing now factored into operational capacity, 2021 will see remote management tools become integral to core industrial functions.
With industries continuing to face increased resourcing challenges – which Brexit will only exacerbate – unmanned operations allow production to continue even with reduced physical presence.
Remote technology will not only advance processes, it will empower employees. On the shop floor, technology such as simulations and augmented reality (AR) can resolve issues faster – a key criteria for future proofing businesses against the long-term effects of lockdown. These tools maximise support in operations and build collaboration, enabling sites to connect with global talent and ensuring experts are always on hand as the dispersed workforce endures.
The four axes of integration
Efficiency will always be critical for industry. But in the wake of the 2020 crisis, it is even more essential for reducing costs and reinforcing learnings. Moving forward, we will see industry achieve efficiency through four axes of integration:
• Integration of energy and automation: to achieve the two core foundations of efficiency: energy and process. This will enable long term cost reduction while curbing carbon emissions and resource consumption – a key factor for UK 2050 Net Zero targets.
• Vertical integration of end-point to cloud: connecting every aspect of a process, from the shop floor upwards, so data is accessible and transparent in real-time. A first step to applying data to drive business development will be to better manage its application in existing processes.
• Lifecycle integration: from design and building, to operation and maintenance, eliminating all discontinuities and inefficiencies in the transition from CapEx to OpEx. This will enable a seamless collaboration as well as a lifecycle integrity of all data.
• Unified Operation Centre integration: by shifting from the traditional side-by-side, workshop-by-workshop, site-by-site management model, industry will be able to achieve a single version of the truth to enable a big-picture view of energy and resource consumption. This will be a complete benchmark of all facilities and the optimisation of every company on a global scale. Achieving this will be a true indication of digitisation.
Sustainability as a business model
The Covid-19 crisis has been a wakeup call. For many of us, the fundamental threat to the way we live our lives has translated into a greater concern for the impact of global crises, such as climate change, on our reality.
We will see the knock-on effect in industry. The future will see energy and resource consumption data applied intelligently. Companies will be able to develop a strategy focused on efficiency, electrification, circularity, and decarbonization, which they then can execute and iterate.
The recent government announcement of a 10-point plan for building back sustainably post-Covid is more evidence of this. As we move into 2021 and beyond, big businesses have a responsibility to be aligned with the sustainability plans for any countries in which they operate. The coming year, we will see industry define its contribution to net zero efforts
The common denominator for success
The countries, societies, and companies that perform best in in the next year and beyond will be those that demonstrate the highest standards of trust: in their staff, their supporters, in digital. On that trust, the empowerment of local, on the ground workers will be achieved.
These two factors – trust and local – will be a common denominator amongst the best performing businesses and industries and will lay the foundations for better resilience, reactivity and capacity to boost performance.
While the fundamentals of industry are solid, what has change is the emphasis on agility and adaptation. In an economy under pressure, in a fragilised world, it is a call for awareness, efficiency, and sustainability.
2020 has taught us not to rely on our existing sense of what is normal. 2021 will be the time to put learnings into practice. While we can’t know for certain what the future will look like, we do know how future challenges will be overcome –digitisation.
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