WHY IT MATTERS: Digital Transformation

WHY IT MATTERS: this is a huge step forward and a sign of the times: manufacturing automation. Fueled by digital, automation, and robots, this enables production of smaller batches economically. When this is rolled out at full scale - I assume it still requires development and lots of tweaking - we can expect retailers to shorten the time from idea to production. with eCommerce, it enables the make-to-order that was made popular by Dell computers in the late 1990s: onl;y build the computer when an order has been placed. Expand this idea to t-shirts and you can see why this new Alibaba production facility is so important...

WHY IT MATTERS: once we get over the health crisis, we will need to address the economic crisis. Key supply chain technologies will offer retailers and manufacturers solutions to reduce cost and their dependency on global trade fluctuations.

WHY IT MATTERS: factories are being transformed by digital at a rapid pace and this paper provides insights into that transformation, including how technologies are being deployed today.

WHY IT MATTERS: the USA will bring back manufacturing from emerging countries - but it will not bring back jobs. This article is one more example of this trend: robots are now cheaper, faster, and generally better than humans at doing repetitive tasks. So much so that robots can manufacture clothes better than humans can. See the videos here: http://softwearautomation.com/digital-t-shirt-workline/

They say factories of the (near) future will have only one employee and one dog: the dog is there to keep humans out of the building, and the human is there to feed the dog! ;-).

WHY IT MATTERS: robots present a solution for the skilled labour shortage and requirements to cut production times and reduce costs in an era of personalization. Read the report for more data.

WHY IT MATTERS : the video provides a great review of the state of technology when it comes to robots and robotics today from one of the leading researcher in the field. The talk is peppered with short videos of actual robots so you get a good sense of what's possible today. But remember that we live in an exponential growth era, so things improve very fast.

WHY IT MATTERS: robots will grow and bring back manufacturing to "developed" countries such as the US but they won't bring back jobs.

WHY IT MATTERS: I shy away from these projections but here it comes from scholars at Oxford and Yale so I give more value. Moreover it tracks with the projections I have read from the Singularity is Near and other books on the matter. Moreover I like the visualization because it shows concrete tasks that we can all relate to. And look at the timeline, remembering that 2026 is less than 10 years from now...

WHY IT MATTERS: robots are everywhere and PWC projections from 2014 shows growth in many areas outside manufacturing.