What do UK manufacturers think of 4IR?

Turning the 4th Industrial Revolution into a reality

1st Industrial Revolution - Water and steam mechanises production (1784-19th Century)

2nd Industrial Revolution – Electric power creates mass production (1870-mid-20th Century)

3rd Industrial Revolution – Electronics and IT automate production (mid-20th-21st Century)

4th Industrial Revolution – Smart manufacturing (today) 

3D Printing, Internet of Things, Advanced Human-machine Interfaces, Cloud Computing, Big Data Analytics, Augmented Reality, Smart Sensors

What do UK manufacturers think of the 4th Industrial Revolution?

Adam Hudson, Sector manager, KUKA Robotics UK:

When Industry 4.0 to KUKA means that we are integrating robots into more operations, robots are becoming more variable in what they do and integrated into different applications.

Chiara Covone, Innovation Director, DS Smith:

So, the 4th Industry Revolution in DS Smith is about putting the end consumer in the centre, making sure that we are leveraging the technologies that are functional for us and the end consumer.

Andrew Steel, Managing Director, FORCAM UK:

Today the 4th Industrial Revolution on a practical level means connecting up people’s assets, people’s factories, people’s facilities.

Mark Frankel, CEO, Arlington Industries:

People coming to the market, that’s what we predominately talk about when thinking of a new revolution, is these new car entrants and new technology around it.

Chris Richards, Head of Business Environment Policy, EFF:

Its really about taking digital technologies applying that to manufacturing process and making it just much more streamlined.

Julie Moore, Managing Director, Green Gourmet:

For us, it’s automating the process.

Sam Turner, CTO, HMV Catapult:

The technology can transform current business process right now, so I would say productivity and quality improvement

Julie Moore, Managing Director, Green Gourmet:

It can also bring in robotics to do automatic slicing

Greg Hewitt, Managing Director, Rock Oil:

Its about taking the traditional manufacturing base of the UK and bringing in some of the technology advances that are happening, so bringing manufacturing closer to every point in the supply chain through to the customer

David Brown, CFO, JCB:

So, innovation is vital for JCB, it’s literally the large point of our company, we operate in a very competitive environment, with very demanding customers and therefore innovation is what we have to do to survive

Mike Rigby, Head of Manufacturing, Transport and Logistics, Barclays:

We can also help them with the 4th Industrial Revolution by supporting them on that journey and understanding them. To actually understanding the investment there about to do, the impact it’s going to have on their business and of course supporting their original funding as well.

Are you prepared for the 4th Industrial Revolution?