Made Smarter Innovation - People-Led Digitalisation
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Bath
Department Name: Mechanical Engineering
Abstract
Imagine you are responsible for the digitisation journey of your company's manufacturing. You know by embedding digitisation throughout the whole manufacturing value chain will bring success. However, your manufacturing portfolio is diverse e.g. high volume fast moving white goods, novel pharmaceutical biological drugs, automotive components, chemical synthesis and aircraft avionics. You also design, manufacture and operate nuclear facilities. Each of the sectors claim they are unique; however, your experience evidences the underlying challenges are common - although often articulated in different ways!
You have learnt lessons from the 1980's where companies adopted automation because 'it was the new shiny technology" but productivity savings were not always realised, and the Made Smarter Review evidenced that in 2017 productivity challenges, still remain - even though the technology is available. You know that people are the critical element. You have seen manufacturing systems fail to deliver because of employee pushback, lack of engagement/skills/leadership as well as poor change management (Made Smarter Review 2017, Vander Luis Da Silva, et al. 2020). You recognise to create value in manufacturing through digitalisation needs investment in people. It is your view that the right combination of current technology, data and people can deliver SMART manufacturing today i.e. if we have the right people, we can be responsive, reactive, make smart decisions to maximise manufacturing value using live data and information. However, to achieve digitally engaged people, especially in manufacturing you believe there needs to be a process for manufacturing companies to follow, regardless of sector and size.
The vision of this centre is to enable 'UK Manufacturing to improve their productivity year on year by investing in their biggest assets - people"". This investment will lead to the uptake of digitalisation.
As part of our ambitious centre, Theme 4 - "Societal and cultural change: managing the disruptive impact of digital technologies." i.e. achieving digitally engaged people is core and will account for up-to 65% of our activities. Around 56% of UK manufacturing (Q2, 2019) are SMEs which are critical to UK Manufacturing. To meet our goal of digitally engaged people our research will engage the whole manufacturing value chain through Theme 3 - "connected and versatile supply chain" our second core theme
However, we recognise investing in people will 'touch' all of the themes and our networking activities will be crucial in leveraging value from the Made Smarter investments.
In summary, our hypothesis is that regardless of manufacturing sector and company size a common process leading to digitally engaged people is achievable in practice i.e. in industry. Impacts from embedding our research into aerospace manufacturing demonstrated the data/information engineers believed they needed, was not the data/information they used to make decisions. We were able to increase their productivity by 47% through a combination of manufacturing digitalisation and human factors. This was achieved through a step-by-step process, using data analytics, human factors and observing people in action. Our centre will build on this expertise and create a generic process for use across UK manufacturing - leading to increased productivity.
You have learnt lessons from the 1980's where companies adopted automation because 'it was the new shiny technology" but productivity savings were not always realised, and the Made Smarter Review evidenced that in 2017 productivity challenges, still remain - even though the technology is available. You know that people are the critical element. You have seen manufacturing systems fail to deliver because of employee pushback, lack of engagement/skills/leadership as well as poor change management (Made Smarter Review 2017, Vander Luis Da Silva, et al. 2020). You recognise to create value in manufacturing through digitalisation needs investment in people. It is your view that the right combination of current technology, data and people can deliver SMART manufacturing today i.e. if we have the right people, we can be responsive, reactive, make smart decisions to maximise manufacturing value using live data and information. However, to achieve digitally engaged people, especially in manufacturing you believe there needs to be a process for manufacturing companies to follow, regardless of sector and size.
The vision of this centre is to enable 'UK Manufacturing to improve their productivity year on year by investing in their biggest assets - people"". This investment will lead to the uptake of digitalisation.
As part of our ambitious centre, Theme 4 - "Societal and cultural change: managing the disruptive impact of digital technologies." i.e. achieving digitally engaged people is core and will account for up-to 65% of our activities. Around 56% of UK manufacturing (Q2, 2019) are SMEs which are critical to UK Manufacturing. To meet our goal of digitally engaged people our research will engage the whole manufacturing value chain through Theme 3 - "connected and versatile supply chain" our second core theme
However, we recognise investing in people will 'touch' all of the themes and our networking activities will be crucial in leveraging value from the Made Smarter investments.
In summary, our hypothesis is that regardless of manufacturing sector and company size a common process leading to digitally engaged people is achievable in practice i.e. in industry. Impacts from embedding our research into aerospace manufacturing demonstrated the data/information engineers believed they needed, was not the data/information they used to make decisions. We were able to increase their productivity by 47% through a combination of manufacturing digitalisation and human factors. This was achieved through a step-by-step process, using data analytics, human factors and observing people in action. Our centre will build on this expertise and create a generic process for use across UK manufacturing - leading to increased productivity.
Organisations
- University of Bath (Lead Research Organisation)
- Manufacturing Technology Centre (MTC) (Collaboration)
- Rolls Royce Group Plc (Collaboration)
- Laing O'Rourke (United Kingdom) (Collaboration, Project Partner)
- WSP Group plc (Collaboration)
- Domino Printing UK (Collaboration)
- Health Services Executive (Collaboration)
- Sonodot Ltd. (Collaboration)
- MicrofluidX (Collaboration)
- Scorpion Tooling (Collaboration)
- Nuclear Decommissioning Authority NDA (Collaboration)
- Environment Agency (Collaboration, Project Partner)
- Boeing (Collaboration)
- British Nuclear Fuel Limited (United Kingdom) (Collaboration)
- Domin Fluid Power Ltd (Project Partner)
- Rolls-Royce (United Kingdom) (Project Partner)
- Logidot (Sonodot Ltd) (UK) (Project Partner)
- Boeing (United States) (Project Partner)
- Anstalt für Verbrennungskraftmaschinen List (Project Partner)
- MicrofluidX Ltd (Project Partner)
- Institute of Asset Management (Project Partner)
- Highways England (Project Partner)
- Scorpion Tooling UK Ltd (Project Partner)
- ARES Software UK Ltd. (Project Partner)
- Manufacturing Technology Centre (United Kingdom) (Project Partner)
- Galorath International Limited (Project Partner)
- Health Service Executive (Project Partner)
Publications
Avci M
(2024)
The wildfire suppression problem with multiple types of resources
in European Journal of Operational Research
Garcia-Lazaro A
(2023)
Intangible capital, the labour share and national 'growth regimes'
in Journal of Comparative Economics
Pontes L
(2024)
The maximum length car sequencing problem
in European Journal of Operational Research
Simeone A
(2023)
A human-cyber-physical system for Operator 5.0 smart risk assessment
in The International Journal of Advanced Manufacturing Technology
Description | ARC tooling (previously scorpion) - review of their manufacturing facility to assist with value model |
Organisation | Scorpion Tooling |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Private |
PI Contribution | We have been mapping their current system and in particular undertaking a value analysis of the product(s) they wish to increase production on. In parallel as part of the work 39 undergraduate students created conceptual value models of the facility. |
Collaborator Contribution | Multiple days of time on site with three of the research team as well as behind the scenes data gathering |
Impact | creation of an initial value model to assist with investment decisions |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | Boeing - Industry Partner |
Organisation | Boeing |
Country | United States |
Sector | Private |
PI Contribution | Attending meetings; University of Bath Visiting Professorship |
Collaborator Contribution | Key Strategic Partner Attended meetings |
Impact | No outputs to date |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | Domino UK Limited - Industry Partner |
Organisation | Domino Printing UK |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Private |
PI Contribution | Attending meetings and events |
Collaborator Contribution | Attending meetings, workshop and event; participated in data gathering exercise |
Impact | No specific outputs as yet |
Start Year | 2022 |
Description | Environment Agency - Industrial Partner |
Organisation | Environment Agency |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Public |
PI Contribution | Attending meetings |
Collaborator Contribution | Key Strategic Partner attending meetings, workshops and events |
Impact | no outputs to date |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | HSE - Industry Partner |
Organisation | Health Services Executive |
Country | Ireland |
Sector | Public |
PI Contribution | Meetings, presentation at conference |
Collaborator Contribution | Key Strategic Partner; meetings, events; Facilitated industry workshop; |
Impact | No outputs to date |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | Laing O'Rourke - Industry Partner |
Organisation | Laing O'Rourke |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Private |
PI Contribution | Attended meetings |
Collaborator Contribution | Key Strategic Partner; Advisory Board member; attended meetings, workshops and industry events; participated in data gathering exercise |
Impact | No outputs to date |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | Logidot - Industry Partner |
Organisation | Sonodot Ltd. |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Private |
PI Contribution | Meetings |
Collaborator Contribution | Key Strategic Partner; attending meetings; industry events |
Impact | No outputs to date |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | Magnox - Industry Partner |
Organisation | British Nuclear Fuels Limited (BNFL) |
Department | Magnox |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Public |
PI Contribution | Attending meetings |
Collaborator Contribution | Attending meetings and workshop events; participated in data gathering exercise |
Impact | no outputs as yet |
Start Year | 2023 |
Description | MicrofluidX - Industry Partner |
Organisation | MicrofluidX |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Private |
PI Contribution | Meetings |
Collaborator Contribution | Key Strategic Partner; Advisory Board member; attending meetings and industry events. participated in data gathering exercise |
Impact | no outputs to date |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | Nuclear Decommissioning Authority |
Organisation | Nuclear Decommissioning Authority NDA |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Public |
PI Contribution | Attending meetings, presentation at conferences and workshops |
Collaborator Contribution | Attending meetings, workshops and events; participated in data gathering exercise |
Impact | no outputs as yet |
Start Year | 2022 |
Description | Rolls-Royce - Industry Partner |
Organisation | Rolls Royce Group Plc |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Private |
PI Contribution | Attending meetings |
Collaborator Contribution | Key Strategic Partner; attending meetings and industry events |
Impact | No outputs to date |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | The MTC - Industry Partner |
Organisation | Manufacturing Technology Centre (MTC) |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Private |
PI Contribution | Attending meetings |
Collaborator Contribution | Key Strategic Partner; Advisory Board Member; attending meetings, workshops and industry events; participated in data gathering exercise |
Impact | No outputs to date |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | WSP - Industrial Partner |
Organisation | WSP Group plc |
Department | WSP UK Ltd |
Country | United Kingdom |
Sector | Private |
PI Contribution | Attended meetings |
Collaborator Contribution | Attending meetings, events; Industry Chair of the Advisory Committee |
Impact | No outputs to date |
Start Year | 2021 |
Description | AI, Robotics and Cognitive Technologies industry event |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | Industry engagement event |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | Domino Printing ThinkJet talk on Machine Learning applications in Engineering |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | Regional |
Primary Audience | Industry/Business |
Results and Impact | Invited to deliver a presentation and discussion session on machine learning applications in engineering. The audience were invited from across the company R&D and manufacturing departments. Led to further collaborations on PhD projects. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
Description | Invited research presentation for NUAA China |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
Results and Impact | invited presentation to Digital Manufacturing group at NUAA China. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
Description | Invited speaker to IMechE webinar on Engineering and Human Factors: Improving Reliability, Productivity and Safety |
Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | National |
Primary Audience | Professional Practitioners |
Results and Impact | Delivered a keynote on Towards Data-Driven Models of Human Behaviour in Collaborative Robotics to industry practitioners. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2021 |
URL | https://events.imeche.org/ViewEvent?code=SEM7332 |
Description | Society of Design and Process Science, Towards a supra-disciplinary design and process science, Workshop Session: Intellectualized Cyber-physical Systems |
Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
Geographic Reach | International |
Primary Audience | Postgraduate students |
Results and Impact | Invited expert panel to discuss challenges for Intellectualized cyber-physical systems. A position paper is being prepared with international panel experts to discuss challenges and perspectives. |
Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
URL | https://sdpsnet.org/sdps-2023/ws5.html |