Last year, companies in the manufacturing sector faced the seemingly impossible challenge of somehow keeping their workers safe from the COVID-19 pandemic while maintaining operations. Now, with cases of the Delta variant surging around the world, it is clear that a return to pre-COVID-19 normalcy is not in the cards.
So, how are today’s manufacturing companies expected to contend with these obstacles while carving out new opportunities for their businesses?
Released in June 2021, Gartner’s report “Top 5 Strategic Technology Trends in Manufacturing Industries for 2021” aims to answer this question by providing research-driven guidance to CIOs. And for a limited time, we are offering access to this report for FREE.
The Need for Digital Manufacturing
As mentioned above, the effect of the COVID-19 pandemic is still ongoing. Manufacturers continue to deal with remote work policies, new health screening and safety protocols, unexpected demand swings, potential supply disruptions and more.
Here, digital transformation can have an impact by stimulating operational efficiencies and business agility. With digital manufacturing, manufacturers can use digital technologies to optimize planning, scheduling, quality management, cost control, material movement, and shop floor operations. This approach, in turn, leads to improved communications, analysis, and real-time data that helps companies meet performance objectives, innovate with new technologies that generate business insights, and be agile enough to respond to disruptions without sacrificing productivity and quality.
Gartner’s report outlines several trends that – when leveraged successfully – enables manufacturers to identify disruption and address business changes, then reorient their positioning to turn that disruption into a competitive advantage. This allows manufactures to more easily maintain global operations, respond to spikes and shortages, and collaborate on solutions with suppliers.
How is the digital factory transforming advanced manufacturing? Get an overview here!
Themes Driving Gartner’s Report
“Top 5 Strategic Technology Trends in Manufacturing Industries for 2021” offers CIOs the opportunity to identify and act on recommendations for digitally transforming their technologies.
According to Gartner, there are two main themes driving the technological trends cited in this report:
1. Location Independence – The pandemic has made the need for location independence increasingly obvious. Now, new ways of working allow employees, customers, suppliers, and others found in the business ecosystem to be located anywhere. This theme addresses the technology shifts that are driving a distributed cloud structure that facilitates anywhere operations in both business and IT. It also describes how a cybersecurity mesh shifts the security perimeter to the individual.
2. Resilient Delivery – The pandemic has made it clear that today’s businesses need to be able to quickly adapt when delivering in a dynamic business or IT environment. Since volatility exists, it only follows that it is crucially important for businesses to have the skills, capabilities, techniques, operational processes and systems in place that allow them to constantly adapt to changing patterns. According to Gartner, organizations should be composable with modular, adjustable and autonomous components and with business and IT processes augmented by hyperautomation. They must also use sophisticated technologies such as artificial intelligence to engineer a sustainable resiliency approach.
How is Stefanini co-creating solutions for the manufacturing sector? Get an overview here!
Access the Gartner Report
Stefanini is dedicated to helping our manufacturing clients achieve successful digital transformation. We are continuing to expand our solutions for digital manufacturing by offering disruptive technologies like IoT, as well as listening to, supporting, and advising our clients.
For a limited time, we are giving you the opportunity to view Gartner’s “Top 5 Strategic Technology Trends in Manufacturing Industries for 2021.” Download and read the report in full.
