How using data effectively can add value to your manufacturing business
23/03/2022
In any manufacturing project, data is fundamentally important to be able to deliver on targets. When we consider any kind of digital technology – for example, AI, augmented reality, digital twins – at the heart of it we’re talking about using data effectively to derive value or a level of impact for an organisation.
Looking at the manufacturing industry today, many of the big challenges centre around data: e.g., data quality, data completeness, and data maturity. All these aspects drive the ability to predict how future operations and future resources will evolve in an organisation.
Creating a data strategy
It’s important to have a very detailed, long-term data strategy, and to think about how data can add value to your manufacturing business. Data should be considered as an asset of your organisation – the more benefit you can derive from that asset, the more value you can create, and the more competitive advantage that you’re going to have.
Increasingly, organisations are recognising the importance of data. They are thinking about how they can improve the quality of their data and how they can evaluate the data maturity that they have. When we work with companies here at Cranfield, they are looking at how they can standardise their processes and improve their systems. Digital technologies can be used in a variety of ways to achieve this.
The impact of digital technologies
There’s a very clear connection between the impact that digital technologies can make on an organisation and the data that’s available or possible to use. Moving forward into the future, it’s likely that organisations will plan much more strategically as to how data can add value to their business, and there’ll be much more design-related thinking as to what type of data should be collected and what type of data should be managed.
This change of mindset will also expand into the wider supply network – whether it’s the customer, the manufacturing processes, the in-service phase, or the design processes – all these different data sets will be integrated across the lifecycle. Essentially, there’s a common theme emerging, whereby organisations want to get value by integrating data across the lifecycle.
For example, sectors that rely on complex engineered assets – planes, ships, trains, etc. – have long lifecycles, whereby an asset could be in use for 30, 40, maybe even 50 years. This is a huge challenge in terms of how data gets to be stored, shared, and accessed, and we need to be able plan for the future with a comprehensive data set that looks at different phases of the lifecycle.
Digital technologies are making it much more feasible to connect data, access data and improve how it is used, in order to add value internally and externally. As such, digital technologies are contributing to a shift in the way people look at data and in parallel business models are changing, because we have more data, or we have better data, and we can process this data much better. This is creating real change in the manufacturing industry, as it is possible to manage risk and uncertainty much better with clearer commercial insights visible.
Find out more about our Digital and Technology Solutions Apprenticeship MSc.
Categories & Tags:
Leave a comment on this post:
You might also like…
Meet the Cranfield alumna named among sustainability’s brightest rising stars
For Julia Anukam, working in sustainability is about being part of the solution. A conscious consumer and long-time vegan, she found her true calling after a re-evaluation of her career priorities during the Covid-19 ...
We need a million engineers who understand accessibility
…and we are, mostly, starting from zero. This arresting, attention-grabbing line was said to me only last month, in a busy London canteen. Who said it, where we were, are and what they said - ...
Cranfield apprentices named among sustainability’s brightest rising stars
Two Cranfield University apprentices have been recognised for their drive, determination and potential to lead the UK towards a more sustainable future. Julia Anukam and Lucie Rowley feature in the prestigious edie 30 Under ...
A Global Perspective: My Cranfield experience in air transport management
Hello, I’m Sudheshna Satya Prakash, an Indian student studying an MSc in Air Transport Management. After meeting Dame Karen Holford, the Chief Executive and Vice-Chancellor of Cranfield in India, my family ...
A Colombian in Cranfield: My journey through aerospace materials
Hi everyone! I’m Mateo Duarte Garcia, an international student from Colombia who recently completed the MSc in Aerospace Materials programme at Cranfield University. Cranfield has been a dream of mine since ...
Researching a market or industry?
We've been running some lunchtime sessions recently on researching markets and industries. Here's a quick a recap for those who took part or a brief introduction for anyone who missed the session. If you need ...