The NASSCOM Centre of Excellence (CoE), Gandhinagar, the digital India initiative of the Ministry of Electronics & Information Technology and Government of Gujarat, have launched the ‘Smart Manufacturing Forum', an initiative to help MSMEs adopt Industry 4.0 solutions.
The Smart Manufacturing Forum will help manufacturing enterprises with an annual turnover of less than Rs 1000 crore to start, scale and sustain the adoption of Industry 4.0 solutions that can aid in optimising operations, maximising capacity utilisation and building a resilient supply chain. The forum will support three verticals: skill & capability building, handholding for the digital journey, and branding & market reach. The manufacturers will also get 24x7 access to a smart manufacturing competency centre, a virtual platform to help them improve efficiency, productivity and safety in plants by experiencing end-to-end smart manufacturing solutions.
"Disparity in tech adoption has increased as large enterprises have accelerated their pace while MSMEs still face the challenges of awareness, accessibility and affordability. The Smart Manufacturing Forum has been launched to enable MSMEs to kickstart their digital journey and become future-ready. The forum will be a closed group of 100-150 forward-looking manufacturing enterprises working with us to build digital talent and implement low-cost and easy to deploy solutions from startups. Our focus will be on helping MSMEs enhance productivity, boost efficiency and become globally competitive," said Amit Saluja, Senior Director & Centre Head - NASSCOM CoE, Gandhinagar.
The Smart Manufacturing Forum was launched at the third edition of UDYAM 4.0 Nayi Disha (Digital Innovation Solutions Helping Atmanirbharta) in the presence of more than 150 leaders from the manufacturing community and founders of deep-tech startups. Addressing the participants, Sachin Gusia (IRS), Managing Director, Gujarat Informatics Limited, said, "Gujarat is an industrial state that has a large number of MSMEs. The support of the government of Gujarat is going to be the lighthouse for the adoption of technology by more MSMEs in the state. The Digital Manufacturing Champions Program, government's IT policies and thriving startup ecosystem are key enablers for providing smart manufacturing push to MSMEs in the state," he added.
The skill & capacity support will be in the form of opportunities for learning and skill-building about Industry 4.0 for employees across all the levels of the organisation, as well as quarterly interactive workshops for leaders' monthly sessions for managers and the workforce to make them future-ready.
The handholding for the digital journey will happen through digital maturity assessment design thinking workshops to build a technology roadmap and solution implementation. Through branding & market reach, enterprises that implement the solution will be showcased as smart manufacturers, and their success stories will be promoted at the national level.
