Manufacturing has been the backbone on which most countries were built during the industrial revolution. These industries have been continuously evolving‚ along with the processes and systems they use. Even with the most innovative technologies‚ the manufacturing industry faces a lot of challenges. Keeping up to date with activities happening in different departments of the same facility‚ or in different facilities located across the world‚ is a difficult task.
Since the late 1900s‚ globalisation has been the hot topic shaping manufacturing. Companies have moved across borders‚ setting up manufacturing plants and hiring third party manufacturers‚ enabling them to reach a larger‚ global consumer base. Although having factories in various locations worldwide brings obvious benefits‚ it also poses a challenge when it comes to sending and receiving information efficiently.
Let’s take a look at how cloud and mobile technologies can enhance communication processes within the industry.
Cloud and Mobile Technology – A Smart Solution
Smartphones and enterprise mobile platforms working with cloud services offer a secure‚ reliable and cost-effective solution for manufacturers‚ as they continue to grow globally and establish new factories around the world.
Tablets‚ smart TV’s and even good old traditional computers can also be harnessed for communication. Since the introduction of smartphones‚ these technologies have also skyrocketed into the smart devices era. Apps enable these devices to continuously interact with a company’s servers‚ to ensure that they have the most recent information available. This enables employees either in a different department within the same factory‚ or located in a factory hundreds of miles away‚ to get access to the same information at the same time‚ with next to no delay.
The Emergence of Enterprise Mobile Apps
The next genre of technology set to revolutionise the manufacturing industry is enterprise mobile apps. Creating bespoke enterprise software has traditionally been a laborious and time-consuming process. Software companies could take years to create a final product ready for an enterprise to use. The software itself often required huge bespoke computers‚ which in turn needed to be managed‚ serviced and upgraded from time to time to keep them running smoothly.
With the app revolution‚ software has been downsized and refined by the mobile app developers. High-capacity and high-performance apps are smaller but lack none of the activities and features that traditional software would handle effectively. Apps also take a fraction of the time and effort to build‚ making them more accessible.
Cloud Storage for Business
Traditional softwares required huge amounts of hard disk space to collect‚ store and process data that was being generated by the company. Businesses not only had to invest in the computer hardware required to run these softwares‚ but also invest heavily in servers and related infrastructure. This required a large amount of physical space‚ and had to be maintained appropriately. Cloud servers and databases have transformed the industry in this respect. Organisations can now maintain the server space in a remote location‚ which can be accessed using industry-specific software.
These three technologies work together to provide peace of mind for members of the manufacturing industry‚ who specialise in the process of manufacturing‚ not maintaining and running hardware. These businesses can now utilise software without investing additional skills and resources into running their systems‚ to ensure that all factories get the right information at the right time.
With these technologies‚ members of a manufacturing company can use their own or company-provided smart devices to access the organisation’s mobile app. In doing so‚ employees can instantly access all the relevant information‚ delivered from the database managed in the cloud.
