Ravi Guttal, CTO at precision manufacturing company Aequs that works with aerospace companies, says they today assess aircraft paint jobs using cameras. The cameras capture data, and then, leveraging a self-learning algorithm, it predicts whether the paint has the right gloss and thickness. “We train our painters using virtual reality and augmented reality, and that too happens leveraging data,” he said.
Data is the centrepiece of digital transformation, and that was the subject of our Friday++ discussion last week.
“ERP systems, computer vision-based data for quality management, for safety management of employees have become pervasive in manufacturing. Most of the machining and moulding centres are IoT enabled. We can collect data, do predictive maintenance of machines, and manage parameters that affect the quality of the products,” he said.
A Gururaj, MD of Optiemus Electronics, a major electronics manufacturer, said you can survive without oota (food in Kannada) for two days, but not without data. He said his smartwatches manufacturing line is totally automated. “We use automated guided vehicles in material management. Even packaging is automated and there are no operators involved. We have embraced industry 4. 0 to a great extent and it’s all based on data,” he said.
Kamal Kashyap, director for the storage business unit in Hewlett-Packard Enterprise India, said every organisation is trying to understand how best to harness data. “Our survey shows that 93% of IT decision makers see storage and data management complexity impeding digital transformation. We have technologies that can bring together fragmented storage, manage that data and analyse it using AI capabilities. Security is ensured through the data security cloud console that sits on top,” he said.
Jabez Selwyn, SVP at Redington India, said many MSMEs too are adopting digital tech in a big way. He said they have the potential to achieve global scales, given what tech can do for product quality and sales reach. Redington, he said, has evolved from being an IT products distributor to one that also provides consulting services to customers, given the complexity and potential of tech.
