As manufacturers worldwide seek to enhance their machines and equipment with online connectivity—an example of the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT)—they are realizing this technology’s remarkable potential. I

Manufacturing is ambitiously pursuing digital transformation by adopting Industry 4.0. New and emerging technologies are used to address numerous goals that are often at odds: increasing customization without losing efficiency or reducing time to market while also improving quality.

In the past, measurement equipment would fail with no warning or frequent error codes would lead to service calls and subsequent costly downtime. 

Today’s manufacturers are under pressure to be more flexible, reduce downtime and costs and increase efficiencies. 

The U.S. manufacturing industry’s skilled labor shortage has been widely reported in the past decade. Millions of jobs became vacant due to the retirement of baby boomers and economic expansion.

Industry 4.0 represents the fourth and newest phase of the Industrial Revolution, one that is centered around interconnectivity, automation, machine learning, and real-time data. 

Netilion Health visualizes the diagnostic data provided by an instrument and receives instructions to address the issue. This improves the ability to respond in cases where maintenance or service is required.

The cornerstone of every manufacturer’s success is the ability to shift gears from one product generation and business model to the next while finding new ways to excel at quality.

In a lean manufacturing process, a poka-yoke method is employed to eliminate product defects by preventing, correcting, or drawing attention to human errors in real time. Industrial engineer Shigeo Shingo first applied the term poka-yoke (“mistake-proofing” in Japanese) to the Toyota Production System. 

Data collection on the factory floor can be a challenge. Even the smallest enterprise can generate massive amounts of data, and collecting this data is only a first step on the path to a successful IIoT project.