2016 – The year of analytics

In the evolution of the Industrial Internet we have now moved on to the stage where many companies are already either in the process of experimenting or introducing different kinds of new products and services. At the moment the burning question is how to produce value around these innovations. Juha Pankakoski, CDO at Konecranes looks back at the year 2015 and forecasts the hot topics in 2016.

In the past year the floor has been taken on multiple occasions to ponder on the questions of how to create the right revenue models, and how to productize the collected data. In other words, the general interest has shifted from the technology itself to the impact it will have on the existing business models and business logics.

Collecting data alone is not enough. Neither is being able to utilize it and developing it further into new knowledge and insights. All of this needs to be done in such manner that certain, concrete actions come out of it. Think of it as a loop that needs to be closed: already before heading to the first curve you need to know how to close it.

We are now beginning to understand how certain functions in older products can be utilized to serve some of the new goals. In elevators, for example, there is a statutory alarm system that needs to be checked every day. All elevator cars must be equipped with an emergency button that at any time, once pressed, connects the elevator to the service center. So basically what we have is an existing connection and a platform that can be expanded into new functions by adding sensors, data collection features, and such.

Another very concrete example is the troubleshooting on offshore oil rigs and large cruise ships. With new remote monitoring systems any problems or faults in marine vessels can be detected and even repaired from mainland using remote connection. Analyzing the data sent from the offshore vessels also enables a more preventive approach on maintenance planning when the ship is ashore.

The year of the hackathon

Hackathons are events where coders and designers assemble to collaborate intensively for a certain period of time to create new digital software and solutions. One of the main goals of setting up hackathons is to make it easier for different companies and businesses to encounter despite of their size. And luckily this is something that truly has been achieved with these events in the past year. Forums where different actors all come together and utilize each other’s know-how to find new solutions and overcome obstacles have really increased the understanding of what kind opportunities are at hand.

Augmented reality was another hot topic in 2015, and a lot has happened on that front. Companies are pushing out products, such as virtual reality glasses, at an accelerating pace. Many of these still need further development before qualifying for industrial use, but they are close. I believe that breakthroughs are just around the corner.

Using augmented reality in business can mean, for example, being able to better utilize expertise throughout the organization and especially in the field. Consulting and supporting colleagues conducting customer visits becomes easier from a distance, for instance, when the absent can get a realistic view of the situation at hand onsite. This not only helps increase and share knowledge inside the company, but also improves quality from the customers’ perspective.

The importance of analytics

The focal thing that is likely to gain a lot of attention in the near future is the importance of analytics expertise. As said, in 2015, the focus was mainly on building the suitable technology that enables monitoring and data collection, whereas now the main motivation is to process that data into new kind of operation, which then generates value. As a result, the role of data analysts and scientists will surely become more important in strengthening and further developing companies’ competitiveness. Also, we will undoubtedly be introduced to numerous new concepts that draw from machine learning, pattern recognition and so on.

Finally, a trend that will most likely continue to shape the industry in 2016 is the ongoing discussion about dominant standards and platforms. I believe that it is still too early to expect any system to gain superiority over the others. However, I do think that more and more actors have realized that the chances of survival for closed systems are rather weak. From where I stand, the future is in open source software and modularity.

All in all, finding out what works and what doesn’t is basically about learning things through trial and error. This is why we need to keep putting our heads together for the greater good.

Juha Pankakoski works as CDO at Konecranes

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Arranging hackathons to make IoT-innovation easy

Hackathons have been making their mark as a way of offering novel solutions to industrial companies. One of the most interesting concepts is Industryhack, a Finnish start-up which aims to shake up the traditional hackathon formula by arranging weekend-long events for teams of coders to come up with promising new solutions for industrial partners.

“[We] were started to create concrete IIoT experiments and learn what it really means for different industries”, Ville Riikkala, co-founder of Industryhack says in this ZDNet article. Read more about the current state of hackathons at: http://www.zdnet.com/article/industrial-iot-from-cranes-to-prototypes-how-hackers-are-digging-out-new-openings/

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Interfaces play a big part in connecting machinery and the operators

Clothing materials that ping your location to heavy machinery at any given time. Smart warehouses that keep track of every object that is in their premises. Augmented reality arriving to industrial environments. How can companies make sure that they take the most out of the technology that’s going to surround them everywhere? And what are the main benefits in having an industrial internet in ports, in warehouses or in the corporate headquarters? It all begins in your pocket, writes Johannes Tarkiainen, Industrial Design Manager at Konecranes.

The good practices come from the consumer market

Apple buys Metaio, Microsoft launches Hololens. The headlines say it all: Big leaps toward a fully realized Industrial Internet are taken continuously, and the large enterprises in the know are already making their moves. At the same time smaller companies are passing milestones in the way data is produced and processed. The data itself is moved increasingly to the cloud while offering larger amounts of analytics, transforming collected data into information – and finally into knowledge. With the rapid-fire advancements also come boosts in efficiency and safety.

A great deal of people already have some experience with wearable technology, more precisely their smart phones. According to one prediction[i], by 2018, over two and a half billion people on the planet will have a smart phone, compared to the 1.75 billion in the end of 2014[ii].

For industrial companies, a lot can be learned from the consumer market applications. The operating systems and applications that are available for consumers are easily adaptable to fit the needs of the user. They also rely more and more on a highly visual way of representing the world helping the user to decipher information at a quick glance of a screen. The applications that make the biggest mark have a very intuitive and straight-forward user interface. The main idea is to, after all, help the user and simplify a task that might have been more complex if it wasn’t for the application fitting perfectly in that context. The same should be the goal for industrial applications.

That’s why the context matters the most when designing meaningful solutions for an industrial wearable application. A company must reflect the things that the user experience brings to the business in question. A solution that is designed for one environment might not fit the needs of another. The necessary toolkit for an end user operating in a port is different from the toolkit that is needed in steel industry, for example.

Making the workplace more safe and more efficient

From a business standpoint, the biggest advantages in implementing wearable applications comes in the form of increased safety and efficiency. Production facilities, for instance, especially in primary production have their share of blind spots. Augmented reality applications might prove as a solution for making sure that the activity near these areas will not end up disrupting the work flow or cause hazards in the facility.

Wearing a helmet, a vest, or a watch that informs the surrounding ecosystem of your location at all times could, for example, be integrated into a system that instructs automated large or moving machinery to slow down or halt when a person approaches them from around a corner. Due to the advancement in video technology and the decreased amount of time it takes to process large amounts of incoming data, personnel won’t even have to enter possibly hazardous environments in the future. Instead they can manage and follow the production of goods from any location they deem suitable.

As for the efficiency, having an automated log of every object in the facility is a huge time saver, as is the possibility to automate the maintenance of machinery: If a machine is arriving to the end of its lifecycle, or if a certain part is enduring more wear than it is intended to, it is possible to have the equipment send diagnostic data automatically to order repair or replacement.

The demands for operator skills evolve with the changing machinery

The changing demands and opportunities on the factory floor also affect the needs for the training of the employees. Compared to the production plants of yesterday, the modern equipment have a much shorter lifecycle. Earlier there might have been, for example, a controlling device for a hoisting device that hadn’t changed for decades, and it still could have been completely suitable for the surroundings, but now the technology is evolving rapidly, bringing new demands to the support functions, ways of thinking and the need for a solid understanding of the changing surroundings.

This also has the effect of making the demand in the workforce shift from direct operators to a more process control oriented approach, where the emphasis is more on the diagnostics and ensuring that the machinery runs proficiently in contrast to physically operating them. This also increases the demand for continuous training: with new technology comes new user interfaces, operating systems and through them, new skills required. The operations will be more digital and require more skills to utilize IT than before.

These are only a few examples of the road to a more complete intelligent industrial environment. With the amount of innovations that are made every day, we can only imagine, what new types of applications might be on their way to help provide a frictionless, smoother workflow, and how the production plant of the – surprisingly near – future might operate or look like. Not to mention the personnel operating within.

Johannes Tarkiainen works as Industrial Design Manager at Konecranes.

[i] http://www.emarketer.com/Article/2-Billion-Consumers-Worldwide-Smartphones-by-2016/1011694
[ii] http://www.emarketer.com/Article/Smartphone-Users-Worldwide-Will-Total-175-Billion-2014/1010536

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Hacking and Innovation Webinar – practical findings from Konecranes hackathons

Konecranes’ recent IndustryHack events were about realizing concrete results from the welter of ideas. Now an upcoming webinar will get right to the heart of the most practical findings of the events, with the focus firmly on how these will impact Konecranes’ culture of innovation.

IndustryHack presented hackers with the toughest of challenges; the extraction of real customer value from the sometimes intangible world of the Industrial Internet. The 30 minute webinar will sum up the most intriguing concepts, some of which are already at the implementation stage.

Jari Pehkonen, Industrial Internet Service Development Manager, will be speaking at the webinar, explaining the forward-thinking impetus behind IndustryHack,

“The design work of cranes and their control systems has been driven to become more team work-orientated and the development process has become more agile. Each member of the team has a specific task, whether it’s system development, interface design or testing”.

According to Pehkonen, the teams at Konecranes consist of young talents and professionals with extensive experience.

“This has created team spirit and fostered a culture of team work in a new way, improving the quality of the systems created and leading to an environment of innovation, where employees with different backgrounds and experience level learn from each other. This culture also enables new and bold events such as the hackathons”.

Webinar will shed light on new ways of working

Andrew Quinn, Process and Training Owner, will also be speaking at the webinar, presenting real case studies from IndustryHack and explaining how the Industrial Internet can change the workplace for the better.

As Quinn says, “One of the big ideas was inspecting without inspection; a new way of gathering data from various machines and utilizing this, so that when our technicians actually go to site they already know what work needs to be carried out”.

This webinar will be a must for anyone interested in the pragmatic realization of the Industrial Internet and takes place on December 8, 2015 at 3PM (UTC +2h). Sign up here: https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/4095891190657136385

How will the Industrial Internet affect global material flows?

The Industry of Things World was held in Berlin on September 21 – 22.2015 and Industrial Internet Now was present. Two days of inspirational keynotes, workshops, panel discussions and networking activities drew together hundreds of decision-makers from 40 different countries to gain a deeper business and technical understanding of Industry 4.0 and the Industrial Internet landscape.

Industrial Internet Now asked six experts about their views on how the Industrial Internet will affect global material flows.

What is the hottest topic in Industrial Internet right now?

The Industry of Things World was held in Berlin on September 21 – 22.2015 and Industrial Internet Now was present. Two days of inspirational keynotes, workshops, panel discussions and networking activities drew together hundreds of decision-makers from 40 different countries to gain a deeper business and technical understanding of Industry 4.0 and the Industrial Internet landscape.

We interviewed six experts on what they see is the hottest topic in Industrial Internet right now.

New renaissance in manufacturing

Smart manufacturing is changing the way we look at automation and manual work. Gary Mintchell, an acclaimed writer, advisor and speaker on technology and manufacturing, shares his views on what are the pros and cons of the digitalization that is currently revolutionizing manufacturing. What will be the role of humans in the process of manufacturing goods?

Mintchell views the development as a natural part of evolution in industrialization. People have always tried to lighten the burden of manual labor with technical solutions and innovations. This has freed their time to focus on other things and has also made work more secure.

“What we are really doing is making things safer – we have removed people from potentially dangerous locations in various sides of manufacturing, for instance in painting and automotive plants. We have always focused on an ergonomic way of doing things in order to prevent repetitive stress syndrome and all that. Current technological developments allow us to focus on how we can further use things like robotics, working alongside people, to make processes more effective and, furthermore, how we can have people and technology working together safely.”

New types of jobs will emerge

With smart manufacturing reducing the need for human labor, some jobs will probably vanish – but new ones should also emerge. The challenge with this is that we don’t yet know what those future jobs could be. Mintchell thinks that new types of employment come from the visionary people that develop new products and services, of which we may not know about today. On the other hand there are actually a lot of jobs that require people skills or relationship skills. That is likely to stay that way.

“I think that people will be displaced from one kind of work and hopefully they will be put into another kind of work that is more human. Work that requires more of the entire human being – not just their hands or their back.”

What will smart analytics mean for manufacturing businesses’ efficiency or their supply production chains? Well, those are also going through a paradigm shift. By harvesting all the data in a plant it is possible to monitor the performance in real time, noticing what works and what doesn’t minute-by-minute. No more monthly reporting that lets you know what happened in the past when it’s already too late to change it. Smart analytics can help reduce the very costly stoppage times and provide better tools for planning all turnarounds and downtime in plants.

“Maintenance people are learning that there is this existing technology in their plants that they didn’t know about that has the ability to monitor things and stop wasting time. No more sending people off to lubricate some bearings or replace some valve just because it’s always been done every five years – no matter whether it actually needs to be done or not. Less money and time wasted.”

Helping and empowering people to adopt new tools

The biggest hurdle with these smart analytics is that people might not know how to use them. Properly capitalizing on industrial internet requires a change in human behavior. This won’t happen overnight.

It takes some time and effort to motivate people and explain the advantages of the tools at hand. Unfortunately there are even examples where the technology is there but it has been deliberately switched off because people still believe they can spot things better with their own eyes than with the help of technology. The innovations can’t help you if you don’t let them.

“There is, for example, a technology called HART (Highway Addressable Remote Transducer). Many of the instruments in plants are enabled by HART which is a digital technology over an analog signal. Some people are only using the old fashioned analog signal and have not even turned on the digital part that would provide valuable information to them.”

One way of getting people to use the technology is improving the user interface. According to Mintchell, a lot of effort is being put towards this as we speak. Overall, it has a lot to do with our willingness to try and learn new things and open our eyes to the possibilities of the new era.

“It’s about how we can help people become better business managers. How we can use these technologies for business problems, not just for control problems. Instead of thinking about automation as the end, automation is just a platform where we can control things better and enable people to make the appropriate decisions. I think we are on the verge of a new renaissance in manufacturing.”

Gary Mintchell works as an advisor and speaker. He is also the editor of The Manufacturing Connection: http://themanufacturingconnection.com/

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Augmented reality enables a new way of working

The technology called augmented reality (AR) refers to a live, direct or indirect, view of a real-world environment whose elements are augmented by computer-generated sensory input such as video or graphics. The technology has been utilized in mobile devices for some time now, but now with wearable technologies including optical head-mounted displays, AR is making its way into industrial environments. Olli-Pekka Nieminen, Senior Innovation Specialist at Konecranes takes a look at the key benefits AR wearables will bring to the factory floors and warehouses.

We have probably all assembled furniture using instructions and thought it would be a one-hour task. Then, after three hours when we have finally finished, we find ourselves still left with a few nuts and bolts. If we could get the instructions in front of our eyes in 3D, we could really see which piece goes where and the task would be an easier one. And, of course, more fun.

The ability to work freely using your both hands is a big advantage. Even though we are able to read instructions from paper, a smartphone or a tablet, there really isn’t any other solution enabling work with both hands than the wearable technology. But how does one navigate without clicking? Operating the glasses is based on the movement of the head or eyes. You can also navigate using voice commands, or in some models, using a separate touch pad.

In the future we will also see gesture-based controlling and virtual keyboards as methods of operating things. One possible development is also the integration of smart watches with AR glasses, where the menu options would be controlled on the smart watch, which would then project information on the AR glasses.

But what sort of possibilities does this technology bring to everyday businesses?

One of the benefits of AR technology includes sales. Using wearable augmented reality enabling eyeglasses, you can virtually bring the product or the equipment to the clients’ premises. Applications that allow you to model furniture through AR in your home already exist.

The potential in customer service is intriguing as well. For instance, a stewardess on a flight is able to get detailed information through her eyeglasses about the passengers with special needs or requests on board.

Equally, house renovations could be planned utilizing 3D-models and augmented reality software. Architects could also depict how a house would look like in a certain landscape. A retail store can plan the placement of products inside a store. When purchasing a new car, the technology enables us to test how a particular fabric or color would look like on the dashboard. The sales person is also able to bring additional information about a car directly in front of the potential buyer’s eyes.

In industrial environments, such as factories, the AR technology enables planning changes in the layout, location of the machinery or simulating material flows in a new way. A production manager on the factory floor is able to get detailed information on the capacity and condition of the machinery right on the glasses just by looking at the equipment. Or if there is a fault, you can get the fault codes and the exact location of the fault right in front of your eyes. The possibilities are immense.

AR in industrial environments

Warehouse picking and maintenance are the key areas in industrial environments where AR can be utilized.

In the picking process, warehouse workers can be instructed where certain units are and they can sign for them instantly. When there is a QR code or a bar code, the application recognizes a certain unit and its information just by scanning it.

This enables better operation. It all comes down to recognizing and scanning a product and providing instructions for next actions. All of this enables working more effectively and with less training when conducting inventories.

The key benefit of AR in warehousing is speed. It enables the right information at the right time and place, as well as reporting at the same time. It also reduces the costs caused by faults, which occur when, for instance, the wrong product gets delivered. It lowers the risk of sending the client the wrong product. It is also possible that this technology improves the circulation in warehouses. The AR technology will also shorten the amount of training that is needed to achieve a certain level of competence. In a nutshell, the preciseness of the work, quality of reporting and employee satisfaction all improve, while the amount of errors reduces.

The possibility for augmented reality also enables better maintenance. When a fault occurs, the maintenance person puts on his or her glasses, opens a video connection to a back office expert who can pinpoint the fault in the equipment and give instructions for any necessary actions. The expert sees the same things that the maintenance person does and they can co-operate. Of course, this doesn’t mean that just anybody with AR glasses can conduct maintenance or that the need for skillful maintenance personnel will reduce. AR technology supports the maintenance personnel, it does not replace them.

Guidelines can be imported to machine operators, such as how a certain operation can be carried out in the most efficient manner or what is the next job in the queue. Machine performance data can also be brought to the operators’ vision scope, which would show whether the machine is operated inside allowed limits and what its current settings are. This would improve both safety and productivity in industrial environments.

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Video: Machinery becomes aware of its own condition

The key difference that the industrial internet makes, is that it brings machinery alive, says Juha Pankakoski, CDO of Konecranes. It brings sensing and communicating capabilities to places where they’re not expected to be found. This enables the machinery to sense its own condition, understand the usage situation and support the user to carry out the operation more safely and productively. Click here to find out more on Juha Pankakoski’s thoughts on the industrial internet:

New business instead of just new technology

Taking advantage of new technology can help companies to function under their old business models, but re-evaluating this approach might actually be more beneficial to the company. According to Kalle Kantola from FIMECC Ltd., an open innovation company, manufacturing companies shouldn’t just stick to their old ways – they should take their cue from start-ups and start moving towards new directions immediately.

Companies in the manufacturing industry are embracing new digital technologies, while business is turning more fast-paced and service-oriented. This does not necessarily mean that companies with the most up-to-date technology will be leading the race. According to Kalle Kantola, the business models of the industrial internet are based on immaterial value creation rather than purely technology-led operations.

“When talking about the creative possibilities brought on by the industrial internet, it’s essential to have a customer-focused perspective. The industrial internet is not progression focused solely on technology, and so it should be considered a phenomenon that is changing current business models. The new service business models are based on exact, reliable and automatic information”, Kantola argues and continues by stating that information is also what motivates the change.

“Precise real-time data from all kinds of sources, including machines, makes business processes transparent and shows how clients are using products. Smarter decisions, products, services and development programs are speeding up the transformation. Data on how markets are changing makes it possible to predict future client needs and offer solutions to suit these needs quickly.”

Kantola finds benchmarks for the manufacturing industry’s future business models in certain B-to-C companies.

“Spotify did not digitalize music, it only took advantage of the digitalization started a long time ago by electric guitars and techno music. The company changed the business process of purchasing and distributing music and made everything much easier than ever before. This allowed Spotify to challenge even the most established companies in its business environment. The same goes for Über, who is still using taxis to take people from place to place. The only thing that has changed is that a different business process makes paying and ordering easier – also increasing transparency and safety.”

By reconsidering their business processes, trying new things quickly and sticking to them while seeking new opportunities, companies in the manufacturing industry could expand into new market areas. This innovative approach, sometimes called the “quick and dirty”, is a common tactic in the start-up world where continuous renewal is a must. Kalle Kantola strongly believes that heavy industries could adopt lighter experimentation as part of their long-term R&D and manufacturing processes.

“Start-ups are rarely burdened by history, they don’t have the need to preserve their current business model. On the contrary, start-ups try new ideas and abandon them if they prove to be dysfunctional. Since start-ups usually have limited resources, they are eager to cooperate openly with other companies, which brings new business possibilities on the table.”

Industrial baby steps towards a new business model

In Kalle Kantola’s view there are actions that any industrial company could start with in order to transform its business model.

“The main point is to get started, even take some risks. The first steps won’t be huge leaps, but a lot can be achieved by taking them. If time is wasted while competitors are moving forward, taking the first step might start to feel like a huge leap.”

”The nature of the business determines what the first step should be. For companies in the manufacturing business, being able to optimize and manage their complete value chain would be a good first step. Understanding what kind of new approaches the customer is willing to pay for and focusing on those, is another good example. Optimization of the company’s processes is not enough if it does not come across as clearly benefitting the customer”, Kantola explains.

Kantola also highlights digitalization of the business process, market differentiation planning and enhancing user experience as concrete examples of moving in the right direction. He underlines that combining a progressive stance should be maintained when making decisions.

“Companies are usually afraid of the changing markets and the new competitors that follow suit. The situation should not be approached this way, but rather seen as a possibility. If everybody tries to defend their current business model, new possibilities will never emerge.”

Adopting new business models requires new abilities from the employees inside the company. According to Kantola, combining at least three areas of expertise would make a perfect blend.

“Currently half of the employees working for leading manufacturers of industrial equipment are usually IT and integrated technology professionals instead of engineers. In the future a steady foundation in engineering should be paired with IT capabilities and topped off with a strong insight on the customers’ processes, values and business. Rather than offering the customer bulk, companies should be able to predict the market better than the customer and find added value for its business.”

In Kantola’s view, connecting different expertise will not take place only within one company, as companies will form networks, ultimately forming new business models in the process.

“In the field of manufacturing, business models of the past were typically built on iron. It will become more common that a single company won’t be able to provide everything that a particular customer or market demands. Rather, individual companies will be surrounded with partner networks, or ecosystems, that allow open data sharing. The needed service capacity will be defined together based on customer demand.”

Kalle Kantola works as CTO at FIMECC Ltd

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