This is an educational project aimed at the Polish industrial sector, which shows industry 4.0 technologies in real use.
The supply chain has changed all over Europe, which is a great opportunity for small and medium-sized companies. They can use it thanks to technology, but if they want to go this way, we have to show them that it is effective, affordable and profitable – emphasizes Artur Pollak, president of APA Group. The company from Gliwice has just launched the Industry 4.0 Technology Testing Center. It will allow you to check in practice what the production process based on new technologies, such as IoT, big data or machine learning, on which the concept of industry 4.0 is based, looks like.
- In industry 3.0 we focused mainly on technology and production of products to order, in industry 4.0 a modern team looks at data, analyzes the customer and his behavior, wants to respond to his needs as soon as possible. These are new forms of business operation – emphasizes Artur Pollak, President of the Management Board of APA Group.
Industry 4.0, otherwise known as the fourth industrial revolution, is a process of technological and organizational transformation of enterprises, which includes, among others, digitization of products and services, introducing new business models and integrating the value chain, relying on new technologies, such as big data, artificial intelligence and machine learning, 5G, cloud computing, virtual and augmented reality, new generations of industrial robots and the Internet of Things.
- Industry 4.0 is more a philosophy than a technology. We all need to learn a new approach, but we have to see it first. As entrepreneurs, we do not want to waste money on something that is useless – says Artur Pollak. – That is why we decided that we would build a center, invite clients and show them how to use it well, plan and implement this change. We wanted to show the business how to use the benefits of modern technologies and forms of team management.
APA Group, specializing in industrial automation solutions, has just launched the Industry 4.0 Technology Testing Center in Gliwice. This is an educational project aimed at the Polish industrial sector, which shows industry 4.0 technologies in real use.
- We invited scientists, technology companies, clients who shared their knowledge and expectations, and enterprises that know about integration, automation and robotization. If we mix all these competences and needs, the result will be a solution tailored to the needs of companies, understandable and affordable, which will eliminate the fear of technological change – explains the president of APA Group.
The center in Gliwice is available free of charge to all interested. It has the formula of permanent online and offline exposure, so that everyone – both on-site and online – can choose an exemplary product, give it characteristic features, and then produce it, monitoring each stage of the production process in real time using in IoT, Big Data or machine learning. Finally, the user will receive a simple report with the indication of quality, performance, cost, energy consumption and CO2 emissions indicators. This will allow you to accurately estimate how much it really costs to produce one component using the technologies on which the concept of Industry 4.0 is based.
- Such centers “radiate” for at least several hundred kilometers. Therefore, the more such solutions we have in Poland, the more people learn about it, the more people look at what it looks like and implement their own solutions, the better our lives will be. We will work less and at the same time earn more – says Przemysław Sulich, vice-chairman of the Committee for Digitization and Industry 4.0 of the Polish-German Chamber of Industry and Commerce, president of the board of A1 Europe.
The center in Gliwice is part of the NAZCA 4.0 pilot project initiated by APA Group. Its goal is to implement the idea of industry 4.0 in companies for which it has been out of reach so far. This is especially true of the SME sector.