Generally speaking, the following ten paths are the only way for China's industry to move from manufacturing to intelligent manufacturing. However, for different industries and enterprises, due to different market demand patterns, different product processes and different management bases, the focus is different. But you can always find several feasible paths to intelligent manufacturing.
No.1 lean
Lean production was first designed to meet the personalized needs of multiple varieties and small batches. Its two pillars are "just in time" and "intelligent automation".
So far, lean management has evolved into a whole value chain lean management concept and method involving marketing, R & D, supply chain, production, process and even entrepreneurship, which has driven the transformation of global industry. From manufacturing industry to service industry, the idea, method and tool of "creating value and eliminating waste" pursued by lean management has promoted the optimal allocation of production resources, and achieved quality, efficiency and anti-corruption The speed should be increased rapidly.
According to the experience of enterprises, as long as the enterprises persist in doing so, most of them can get 50% or even higher promotion space. Unfortunately, lean has not been effectively implemented in most enterprises in China. Most of them just talk about it verbally. Because they are eager for quick success and instant benefits and lack of experience and methods, they can't stick to it and give up halfway.
Intelligent manufacturing can not be built on this inefficient production mode, lean is the first step that must be taken, and it is the path with the highest return on investment. Because lean almost does not require enterprises to make additional investment, just on the basis of existing re allocation of production resources can get more than expected returns.
The successful implementation of lean is not difficult, the key lies in the determination of leaders and the change of management concept.
No.2 standardization standardization
Standardization is the basis of automation and the premise of intelligent manufacturing.
Domestic enterprises sigh that the automation of the automobile industry is high. Why the automobile is so complex can be, but the simple household appliances products are not good, one of the important reasons is standardization.
The common platform and general components adopted by the automobile industry greatly reduce the product cost. The original method of parts production according to the whole vehicle is changed to that of the whole vehicle according to the parts. That is to say, the standardized parts can be mass produced, and the cost is reduced successfully.
Standardization also includes standardized operation process and operation mode. With standardization, automation can be developed based on this. For example, automatic welding, automatic assembly, assuming that parts are changeable and the operation mode is not fixed, automation will be difficult to achieve, even if the cost of realization is high.
No.3 modularization
Automobile and computer are the earliest industries to realize modularization. From modular design, modular procurement to modular production, modularization is also the key to realize low cost and meet personalized consumption. If it is realized, it will be possible to truly personalize products, such as mobile phones, and each person's mobile phone can be unique. People can arbitrarily combine their favorite phones like assembling blocks.
Modularization reduces the complexity from design, procurement to production, standardized interface and connection mode increase generality, reduce manufacturing cost and cycle, and automatic production, logistics and information communication are easier to achieve. As before, the chargers of each mobile phone brand are different. If you change your phone, you will throw away all the mobile phones, which will cause a lot of waste. Now, there are improvements.
Modularization is relatively difficult to implement, involving industry and enterprise standards, and it needs the participation of upstream and downstream enterprises. This is a long-term work, so it is very important to build lean strategic partnership among them.
No.4 automation automation
Automation is the most talked about in intelligent manufacturing. Many local governments and enterprises have called it "machine change", and they have made continuous attempts, and have success and failure.
Enterprises can integrate the original discrete processing methods of raw materials processing through independent innovation, connect the original independent processes through automatic production lines, and implement lean continuous production, eliminating the upper and lower materials, storage and handling of intermediate links, and the production speed and production efficiency will be improved.
Automation and information technology are the most important part of the investment in intelligent manufacturing. Enterprises should be careful before they do automation transformation. Why upgrade automation? What is the return on investment? How reliable is the automation equipment? What are the risks? Can we adapt to the upgrading of products? Make sure you know, otherwise the cost will not decrease and rise.
With the progress of technology and the improvement of human cost, automation is an irreversible trend. For different industries and enterprises, some have mature automation schemes, some do not, and enterprises need to plan the direction of automation according to their own conditions.
No.5 service oriented service
China has more than 600 million Internet users and 700million intelligent terminals. The rapid development of mobile Internet has accelerated the transformation from manufacturing to service. The "industrial Internet" advocated by the United States connects people, data and machines to form an open and global industrial network. Its connotation has surpassed the manufacturing process and manufacturing itself, and spans the whole value chain of product life cycle, covering more industrial fields such as aviation, energy, transportation, medical treatment, etc.
In addition, manufacturing enterprises can also improve the reliability and efficiency of products by monitoring, analyzing and improving the design and manufacture of equipment through the network data of equipment.
Of course, different products of the industry are different, and the content of service can be varied. Under the Internet plus mode, traditional enterprises need to constantly innovate business models and find a suitable service mode to impress customers.
No.6 individualization
In the past 30 years, the market commodity categories have expanded dramatically by dozens or hundreds of times. In the era of personalized consumption, everyone can have their own blogs, microblogs, wechat, etc., and spread their voices.
The realization of high quality and low cost personalization depends on your lean production level, which is called "value is driven by real customer demand". Personalization is next to your standardized and modular design. The rapid development of Internet and other information technology provides support for it, making personalized implementation easier.
At present, personalization or limited conditions of personalization can not achieve complete personalization. Whether it is a car, computer, mobile phone or clothing, personalization is a certain range of choices.
Each enterprise needs to decide its own personalized mode according to its lean level, standardization / modularization level and informatization level. It is not the more personalized, the better, it is based on certain implementation conditions. Maybe the future development of 3D printing and artificial intelligence can provide a possibility for complete personalization.
No.7 Ecologicalization
The competition of enterprises is changing from one enterprise to the one between supply chain and even between ecosystem. "The tide of alliance among big enterprises, especially in the information and Internet industries, is another aspect of the growing co evolution of the world economy. Rather than eating up rivals or competing with them, it is better to form alliances - symbiosis and co-existence..." The future of control is: partnership, collaborative control, human-computer hybrid control, and human beings share control with their creations. "
No.8 globalization globalization
In the world interconnection today, when your enterprise achieves a certain scale, it needs to consider globalization to allocate resources to improve efficiency and reduce costs. Global resources include market resources, design resources, procurement resources and production resources.
China's one belt, one road strategy is to find global market resources and export our surplus capacity including high speed rail technology. Design resources are to set up R & D technology centers abroad to develop products close to the local or make up for the shortage of domestic design capabilities, and can also form 24-hour continuous product development around the world to shorten the R & D cycle.
Procurement and production resources are global supply places with better quality and lower cost. In addition to the unit price of procurement and manufacturing, the problems such as transportation cost increase, supply chain complexity, supply chain visualization, long delivery period, higher inventory, environmental carbon emission, quality stability, local labor policy and exchange rate fluctuation should be considered.
No.9 digitization
Digital is closely related to information technology, and like automation, it is the largest investment in intelligent manufacturing transformation. With the rapid development of information technology, everything can be digitized, from people, products to equipment, to realize the connection of all things.
The product can be digitized from product development and design, material procurement to production delivery through plm/erp software. Each product drawing, each material information and each production process are connected together digitally.
The equipment can transmit the operation data to MES, Internet and other networks through PLC and sensors. Therefore, Ge can optimize its operating parameters through the data analysis returned by the aircraft engine to reduce the fuel cost, and Google can realize unmanned driving of the vehicle.
This means that in the era of "industry 4.0", it is possible for the first time to connect resources, information, goods and people through digital communication! This communication includes information exchange among people, people and products, people and machines, products and machines, machines and machines.
For discrete manufacturing industries such as mechanical equipment, textile and clothing, electronic appliances, household goods, etc., because the manufacturing process and parts are very scattered and the quantity is huge, it is really difficult to realize the connection, even the cost of realization will be very large. The feasible way to these industries is to not be in place step by step and gradually realize. First, lean continuous production technology is applied to connect the main process with the material.
Due to the immature technology and the huge investment, each enterprise needs to weigh the timing of import, and consider the investment return, system reliability, information security risk, talent reserve and other issues as automation.
No.10 intelligence intelligence
Intelligence includes two meanings: one is product intelligence, the other is the intelligent of manufacturing process.
First, we talk about the intelligent of products. Compared with the intelligent of consumer goods, the intelligent of industrial products is more urgent. All equipment need to be added with intelligent control module to automatically collect, analyze and control processing data, and equipped with standard data interface, which can be connected with MES system or other information system of enterprise. These industrial big data will help improve operation efficiency, reduce failure and reduce energy consumption through operation analysis of intelligent software system.
The intelligent manufacturing process is more complex. You need to complete the above mentioned lean, standardized, modular, automatic and digital transformation, and the investment in automation and digitization will be very large.
China has been making the world's largest manufacturing country after 30 years of rapid development, but few world-class products can be taken out. In the next 30 years, Chinese manufacturing needs to change from heavy speed to heavy mass and light speed. It needs to carry out continuous innovation in the above ten fields, and realize the transformation from business model, technology and management to Chinese intelligent manufacturing.