Digital factories 2020

Shaping the future of manufacturing

From conventional factory to digital factory

Accelerating data and technology capabilities

In today’s interconnected world, where customer experiences and new technologies continue to impact the industrial manufacturing business landscape, organizations are racing to implement innovative digital solutions to provide more value and meet increasing expectations.

As digitization continues to impact the way manufacturing companies operate, becoming a digital factory—by implementing solutions based on key technologies to digitize operations, production and their entire supply chain—is imperative for Canadian industrial organizations.

Our Digital Factories 2020 report shows that 91% of industrial companies are investing in digital factories—with some of them moving beyond pilot projects and rolling out digital solutions—but only 6% of all respondents believe their companies are fully digitized.

Data is the lifeblood of the digital factory. A digital infrastructure allows data to flow seamlessly throughout the factory, so that it can run efficiently and shift rapidly to changing conditions. Digital factories use analytics to link, store and make sense of the patterns of real-time day-to-day activities, enhancing a company’s ability to tailor products to customers, manage operations more tightly and increase revenue.

Digital Factories 2020 highlights that 90% of industrial company leaders believe digitization offers more opportunities than risks. And 98% say efficiency gains are the main reason for investing in digital transformation—a digital factory’s integrated planning, better asset utilization, lower quality cost and automation contribute to these efficiency gains.

Using the right methods to gather and manage data throughout the value chain, building a digital workforce and embracing digitization—and its potential—from the top will allow Canadian organizations to identify opportunities to enhance customer retention, generate more lucrative engagements and, ultimately, succeed in the Industry 4.0 world.