Fluctuating commodity prices, global supply chain disruption and the mass shift to remote working: recent years have been tumultuous for the manufacturing sector. On top of that, a study in 2021 found that manufacturing had overtaken financial services as the industry most targeted by cyberattacks.
Digitisation has brought major leaps in productivity – but while the opportunities are there for manufacturers to profit from, what challenges must they overcome in order to do so?
Dean Smith, UK Industry IoT Lead at Cisco, emphasises that we are currently in a ‘4th Industrial Revolution’ and says that digitalisation can address all of the five key concerns held by manufacturers, namely; safety, production, environment, quality and cost.
Smith spoke to Tech Monitor editor-in-chief Pete Swabey about what the future holds for the manufacturing sector, and what steps organisations need to be taking in order to achieve success.
