What are the key opportunities that you see with digitalisation for the manufacturing industry?

Today the manufacturing industry is growing rapidly. The entire manufacturing value chain from design to outbound logistic is working in silos. There is a huge opportunity to integrate the entire manufacturing value chain. We have the CoroPlus® offer of connected solutions that connects systems and processes in production, enabling customers to make use of data and turn it into a competitive advantage.

Obviously, there are big challenges as well. What are these challenges and how can manufacturing organisations overcome these?

We are witnessing the fourth industrial revolution and there are bound to be disruptive forces in the digitalization of production which have consequences for the manufacturing industry and will inevitably change the rules of the game. Challenge is to first embrace the change and have an open mind to take decisive steps in this direction. Being prepared and having an eco-system in place is one more challenge. It would be important for organizations to educate their associates and set up an infrastructure to adapt to this new technology.

Talking specifically about the machining function, what differentiates digital machining from conventional machining in terms of utilisation of technology?

Today many decisions in manufacturing are made based on past experiences and gut feel. Digital machining will use data to make fact-based decision making. Going ahead, there would be mass connectivity, and with connected things comes rapid growth of data available. You might have heard or read that ‘data is the new oil', the ‘fuel of digitalization' and this is what will differentiate digital machining from conventional machining.

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