We spend a lot of time on our customers’ manufacturing lines – from those run by original equipment manufacturers (OEMs), through to their tier one and tier two partners and on to component suppliers.

Despite differences between these companies, the managers who run their production lines talk of common issues: competition is sharper than ever; costs are under pressure; compliance and legislation are onerous; raw material prices are generally on the up; and there’s a drive to accelerate production.

Saylawala: personalisation is now a key trend

Then there’s the consumer: people’s changing expectations have seen the gap separating mass product to made-to-order narrowing fast.

Personalisation is now a key trend: first in food (customised M&M’s anyone) and now with consumer goods, people want things made for them. Take the Vauxhall Adam – it has over 1 million variants, the Citroen DS3 offers 3 million combinations and the 2015 Dodge Viper and Viper SRT really can be ‘one of a kind’ cars with a staggering 25 million possible configurations. Indeed, if building things wasn’t already complex it’s becoming more so. 

Gartner projects that 25 billion connected things will be in operation by 2025. With smart sensors and labels and tags attached to items the internet of things promises to transform visibility over your production line.

Another core part of manufacturing that we believe can be significantly improved is the Standard Operating Procedure (SOP). By replacing paper-based SOPs with digital versions on tablets PCs – including video content –you can provide clearer guidance for your teams. In addition, working to SOPs will become more intuitive with voice software relaying step-by-step instructions to teams.

And, in the not too distant future, augmented reality will further improve processes. For example, enhanced reality glasses can display data, images and video to provide all the information a cell worker needs – in front of their eyes – to follow exact procedures.

With digital content changes to SOPs are less cumbersome while intuitive guidance will drive new product introduction and process improvements.  Warehouse-Package-Scanning.