Here's how you can navigate the potential risks of using new technology in manufacturing.

Part of the risk assessments includes using prototypes of the new technology to try out in lab environment. Small samples of experiments should be carried out, have the stakeholders to participate in testing and gather all concerns and approval.

Risk should be assessed in four main categories that should link with your strategic plans: They are? Product mix: In the new and future factories, flexibility is becoming a key factor. The need of producing multiple product variants in the same assembly line create demands for quick re-balancing of the factory to adapt to the new products. System complexity: Production systems are constantly becoming more complex, and as a result production critical operations depend on networked systems. The importance of managing configuration, software versioning, and access control will be vital to maintain quality control and uptime in production. Human factor & Sustainability

Human factor: There is a high dependency on operators to achieve the industry quality standards. With new technologies emerging in a fast pace, adoption goal to leverage the potential, systems must be user friendly and the vast amount of data created in the assembly process needs to be processed with the most important information presented to the operator. Sustainability: Sustainability matters to your customers, employees, partners and stakeholders and is quickly becoming a question of survival. The answer is to do more with less by implementing more resource efficient manufacturing processes. But time is running out.

Every stage of the product development process involves some level of risk. I usually make plans to have several choices or answers ready when dealing with manufacturing process deviations. Assessing the risk can be aided by completing qualitative and quantitative analytical reports. The risk associated with using new technology and adopting a new manufacturing method for the product is higher for our current workforce. With the help of a RACI matrix or a risk charter, one might easily evaluate risk and create manufacturing strategies to produce a higher-yielding product by taking into account all of the aforementioned risks.

Industry 4.0, or the fourth industrial revolution, is profoundly changing the way companies manufacture, improve, and distribute their products. By integrating new data-driven technologies manufacturers are digitizing, automating and creating Smart Factories that are more productive, operator-friendly and material and energy efficient. Or in other words, a major leap forward in the transition to more sustainable industrial manufacturing. Key areas to be looked in to a different perspective are: Product mix: System complexity: Human factor: Sustainability:

A good way to execute strategic planning is to use tools like Value Stream Mapping to create an ink-and-paper model of your systems such that both your goals and timelines are more realistically aligned with the scale of your setup. This will help you set much more realistic and smart goals.

Strategic planning is a key when introducing new technologies in manufacturing processes. Start by defining clear goals and the results you expect from the technology upgrade. This will help you focus on solutions that align with your business goals. It's also important to set realistic deadlines and budgets to avoid exceeding resources. Engage with stakeholders, including employees who will be directly impacted. It is very important to plan strategically in new projects, to avoid unnecessary expenses and waste, for example if you are going to buy new machinery or materials, if you plan with time, you can look for the best option. (cost, delivery time, quality). All this is reflected in productivity.

There is a philosophy which may help someone jump the fence of deciding if and when and how much to train people up and down the organization - it goes this way, “Your people want to be trained, and need to be trained, in order to be counted on.”

The open and close communication of people with their supervisors not only helps to be clear about the objective, but also to strengthen bonds of trust, which causes people to become more involved in the team, contributing more ideas that lead to improvement. keep going.

The system testing in my opinion can be associated and expanded to the PoC (Proof of Concept): is the process of gathering evidence to support the technical and financial feasibility of a system. Project managers perform a POC in the early stages of development before committing too much time and resources to a project. The purpose of a proof of concept is to demonstrate project viability to product teams, clients, and other stakeholders. A POC may uncover flaws, leading the company to revise or abandon a project. In other cases, a POC can confirm the likelihood of project success, providing evidence of viability for development.

I think an important addition to testing is also the iteration speed. When you test a system it's crucial to make quick adjustments and test again, and the speed at which you're able to iterate is the speed at which you'll be able to implement. That's why it's important to have a very trusted implementation partner or have in-house infrastructure to be able to do it.

Producing a product is a labor-intensive process with numerous steps. During a product manufacturing line, it would be a good idea to implement modifications with the proper processes. It is usually preferable to break implementation down into manageable chunks and introduce process changes one at a time, seeing how each one makes things easier. If the changes are not managed effectively and implemented gradually, team stability, production yield, process variation, and quality will be negatively impacted.

In my experience monitoring should start at the conception of the project itself. Key metrics that align with organisational goals should be identified at the start and monitored throughout the various stages of implementation to track the success of your project.

No matter how advanced is the technology, the risk assessment remains the same….go back to basic. Do SWOT analysis and come up with a solution based on this analysis. Importance of all, don’t forget to use Poke-Yoke.

Documentation is one of the important things to consider in any product development and manufacturing during each process helping navigate back to the process to do some analysis (5Why analysis) to crack the potential issues found in later stage when we are using new technology in manufacturing in this new smart manufacturing era. With no documentation digital or handwritten would be like a ship with no compass to navigate back to home.