The manufacturers’ organisation, EEF, and Oracle have joined forces to get UK manufacturers fit for the 4th industrial revolution, now dubbed 4IR.
4IR is being driven by digitisation, big data and other rapid advances in technology. Eight in ten manufacturers say that this next industrial transformation will be a business reality within the next 10 years.
This new industrial age is widely expected to open up new opportunities, as well as challenges, for manufacturing. As a result, collaboration between the technology and manufacturing sectors will gain in strategic importance, particularly in driving productivity, innovation and growth.
Critical to this is identifying UK manufacturers’ experience with and understanding of 4IR, what they want to achieve for their business and how they think digitisation and new technologies will support them.
The collaboration will explore these themes. It will kick off with a series of focus groups with manufacturers around the country and will culminate in an Executive Report that will help industry leaders to identify the key barriers, enablers and drivers of 4IR.
Above all, however, it will provide practical guidance on how manufacturers can adapt and implement new technologies in a way that suits their individual businesses.
Terry Scuoler, chief executive of EEF, said: “This collaboration is an important step forward in providing our sector with thought leadership and practical support and guidance ahead of the biggest industrial transformation of our time.
“It is vital that British companies are able to fully realise the opportunities and stay at the forefront of 4IR. This will require increasing levels of collaboration between our two sectors, so I am delighted that Oracle will help us engage and inform manufacturers on this crucial theme.”
Mark Newton, VP of Applications at Oracle UK, commented: “The British manufacturing industry has always kept up with the pace of innovation, but the advent of the fourth industrial revolution marks one of the biggest technology-driven shifts in modern times.
“Working together with EEF, we seek to provide manufacturers with both the information and practical paths they will need to successfully navigate the changing technology landscape. This represents a significant opportunity for manufacturers to transform their operations and harness the benefits of digital cloud technologies in both the UK and in global marketplaces.”
To find out more about UK manufacturing and 4IR, visit: www.eef.org.uk/fourthindustrial
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