MAY - 20238MANUFACTURING TECHNOLOGY INSIGHTSIN MY OPINIONWhat is agility in manufacturing and why is it so important?Agility isjust another word for adaptability. Most automated processes, like milling, injection molding, and packaging, already have easily adaptable equipment. Over the last 4-5 decades, automated assembly is the one process that still depends on the engineer to order equipment. Agileautomated assembly manufacturing means you can quickly adapt your equipment for multiple production processes and/or families of products to meet consumer demands. Flexible equipment allows manufacturers to produce multiple variants in smaller batches on the same equipment. In other words, most automated assembly machines are single-purposemachines that can do one thing and that's it. Engineer-to-order, single-purpose assembly machine introduce risks to automation, takes up valuable floor space,and is not sustainable. The Economist Intelligence Unit says that "agile firms grow revenue 37 percent faster and generate 30 percent higher profits than non-agile companies." And the need for agility only grows in the face of increasingly common market disruptions.For manufacturers, it's not just about increasing equipment effectiveness. A flexible platform can replace multiple custom-built, single-purpose machines, thus reducing floor space. Furthermore, it dramatically enhances a manufacturer's resilience. A business in the 1990s could produce a single line of product let's say "lipstick" for years from a factory in China. Today, that same business must not only be able to move from lipstick to hair gel in quick succession, but it must be prepared to scale up for a third product it can't predict. A manufacturer that focuses on agile assembly equipment is going to capturemore market shares by getting their product to market faster.Doesn't choosing flexibility to mean slower machines?Not anymore. The conventional wisdom in assembly manufacturing is that you have to choose between being fast and being versatile. But groundbreaking automation technologies have changed the game. A digital, standardized, pre-engineered, and modular platform can offer flexibility and the same or better performance as custom solutions. You don't have to choose anymore. You can be fast and flexible. What about the risks associated with adopting new technology?That's the thing: these technologies I mentioned are not "new". These technologies have been in use for over a decade, and the results speak for themselves. Whether it's reduced tooling, costs, floor space, and maintenance, or the ability to plan, develop, test, and scale up production with unprecedented speed, these machines are the path forward. But manufacturers are a careful bunch who are skeptical of innovation. The general attitudes are why fix what hasn't broken? The answer is the days of Henry Ford "you can have any color, as long as it's black" are long gone. Manufacturers who fear innovations are on the path to a slow death. Companies that fear innovation should heed the lessons that Kodak, IBM, and Blockbuster did not learn until it was fatal to their future. Kodak invented the first-ever digital photography technology in 1975. Executives at Kodak shelved the new invention. Kodak filed for bankruptcy protection in 2012. IBM was a computer manufacturer leader for four decades. The majority of their revenue and profit came from their mainframe sales. Despite trends that showed PC growth and mainframe competitors going bankrupt, IBM AGILITY WINS THE RACEWHY FLEXIBILITY MATTERS IN AUTOMATED ASSEMBLY MANUFACTURINGBy Peng-Sang Cau, VP of Emerging Markets and Symphoni, ATS Life SciencesPeng-Sang Cau
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