INDUSTRY 5.0: THE WORLD OF ROBOTOMATION 

June 9, 2021 5:11 pm

Looking at the ongoing trends, increase in adoption of Industry 4.0, Industry 5.0 and Robotics across the industrial processes, leaders express optimism on creating a digital and robotised future of Indian Manufacturing.

Industry 4.0 is a revolution in connectivity. It’s a digital transformation that connects us through smart technologies such as cyber-physical systems, the cloud, artificial intelligence, and the internet of things.

By connecting production data with various intelligent devices, systems can learn from one another. The shared data optimises production by providing new methods for collecting real-time data and creating value. As we move forward, we are looking for ways to add value through connected virtual and human experiences.

Transformations with Industry 5.0 

 “Industry 5.0 is necessary due to consumers high-demand of individualisation in the products they buy, meaning they prefer a degree of “hands-on” personalisation and customisation with their products. “More and more manufacturers are increasing the human component not only for the customisation, but also for increased efficiency on the production line,” says Rajesh Nath, Managing Director, VDMA India Services Private Limited German Engineering Federation (VDMA).

Subrata Karmakar, President- Robotics & Discrete Automation business, ABB India Ltd. says that automated and connected factories are the future of manufacturing, and Industry 5.0 is touted to take this further. “Industry 5.0 will merge the precision, speed, productivity, and consistency of robots with the creativity and craftsmanship of humans. Today, consumers demand for tailor-made products for their intricate needs, and in a limited time.” The factory of the future must therefore be able to respond much more dynamically to ever-changing consumer requirements, changing demand and current trends.

The changes brought about by Industry 5.0 will shift the focus from rigid automation to flexible application. While Industry 4.0 relied heavily on bringing robots to the manufacturing process, Industry 5.0 will be about ‘Cobots’ or collaborative robots, that work in collaboration with humans.

Sangeet Kumar, Co-founder & CEO, Addverb Technologies explains, “As machines in the workplace get smarter and more connected, Industry 5.0 is aimed at merging those cognitive computing capabilities with human intelligence and resourcefulness in collaborative operations. The pairing of human and machine workers opens the door to countless opportunities in manufacturing.” And since the use cases of Industry 5.0 are still in their relative infancy, manufacturers should be actively strategising ways to integrate human and machine workers to maximise the unique benefits that can be reaped as the movement continues to evolve. 

Whereas, Jhankar Dutta, Managing Director, B&R Industrial Automation Pvt. Ltd. Feels, Industry 4.0 was a fascinating topic for Indian manufacturers. However, with the pandemic, things have changed a lot, and fasciation has transformed into the need of an hour. While many Indian manufacturers are looking for ways to survive the pandemic, those who have already adopted the technology are more likely to sustain and recover faster than the others.

Whereas, according to Vineet Seth, Managing Director – South Asia & Middle East, Mastercam, “Industry 5.0 is a relatively newer terminology, as recent as the past year or two. It is also a very interesting concept. While Industry 4.0 (or the 4^th Industrial Revolution) focused on a connected world, with little or no human intervention, Industry 5.0 envisions an interaction of the human mind, capability alongside cognitive computing to ensure that humans are still an integral part of manufacturing, with machines doing all the arduous work, while humans focus on the tacit and lighter part of the work.”

Hardik Mistry, Dy. General Manager- MTM & Industry 4.0, Ceratizit India Pvt. Ltd., on the other hand, explains that no matter how fast manufacturing companies implement industry 4.0 but certainly it will lead to form a “Future of Manufacturing” in couple of years. The companies which are industry 4.0 ready are naturally talking of industry 5.0. “The visionary predicts industry 5.0 – The future, where human workmen and collaborative robots resolve the issues and work together to boost the speed, achieve highest ever productivity with required precision manufacturing across the processes.”

Amitabh Chaturvedi, Director, InnovaPoint Infotech Pvt. Ltd., says “We have seen a considerable shift in the conversation, in the initial days discussions would revolve around production monitoring, OEE improvement etc. whereas now we are getting enquires around the traceability solution, predictive maintenance, tool cost optimisation which clearly shows that there is greater awareness and maturity.”

Swapnil Sansare, CEO, Divide By Zero, feels that India is slowly evolving through the industrial revolution phase to reach Industry 5.0. “Big data and AI are coming together in analysing tool dimensions, accuracy and precision issues to generate corrective measures tackling unforeseen circumstances without human supervision.”

Vishwanath V Kamath, Managing Director, Fronius India, The Fifth Industrial Revolution, like the Fourth, will rely on data, devices, and artificial intelligence (AI) to substantiate our business. Industry 5.0 is expected to see the transformation of the fourth revolution’s “cyber-physical” manufacturing systems those using digital technologies to operate factories with minimal human involvement into “human-cyber-physical” systems. In the Indian context we need to upgrade our equipment as we want machines to do the things that humans have traditionally done and for this, we need to utilise machines that are exceptionally intelligent.

“As machines get more connected and emphasis is to better utilise human skills, Industry 5.0 would help utilise the best of cyber and physical worlds to drive better collaborative operations. Industry 5.0 directionally will drive mass customisation of customer experience through digital transformation”, explains Arvind Kakru, Country Head End User & EPC Business, Rockwell Automation India.

Sameer Gandhi, MD, Omron Automation, India, adds “It is here as the next phase of industrialisation and indicating the advent of “Autonomous Society” (the world is making a transition from collaboration based man-machine relationship – Optimisation Society- to harmony based man-machine relationship – Autonomous Society – as per OMRON’s SINIC Theory prediction) but for India, most of the manufacturers will take some more time to embrace it as they are still on their way to reap the benefits out of Industry 4.0.”

Bridging manufacturing gap with AI, machine learning and 3D printing

Discussing the manufacturing gap in machine tools industry, Rajesh says Digital transformation is in the heart of Industry 4.0. “At the end of this transformation process, successful industrial companies will become true digital enterprises with physical products at the core, augmented by digital interfaces and data-based, innovative services.” These digital enterprises will work together with customers and suppliers in industrial digital ecosystems.

Subrata on the other hand explains us that automation and artificial intelligence enabled processes have empowered the creation of a connected data eco-system. With the added capabilities of Machine Learning, these systems can identify complex patterns, accumulate experience, and use them to continuously improve and self-optimise over time. Some of its examples are recognition and identification features, finding optimal picking vectors, or efficiently assembling parts together. Much like a human being who learns by doing, a robot develops its adaptability through collected experiences and becomes increasingly flexible, capable and effective.

AI, ML and Robotics etc are disrupting industries such as Automobiles, Healthcare and other manufacturing industries, says Sangeet. Though the rate of adaption is lower vis-à-vis the developed nations, these technologies are playing a key role in automating some of the critical operations. “Experts have highlighted the need to adapt these technologies across many spheres, beginning with education towards enabling individuals to move and work higher up the value chain in innovative capacities.” The most significant impact of AI in the Indian Industries will be enhancing efficiency, and bringing simplicity into the process of production through mechanisation of tasks previously performed by humans.

As per Jhankar’s views, advanced technologies make it possible to integrate older, digitally isolated machines into smart, connected manufacturing solutions. There are many solutions available in the market which can help unconnected devices and lines to upgrade for modern smart factory solutions with unprecedented ease and without changing the existing hardware and software.

Talking about AI and ML for machine tools sector, Vineet highlights that there is very little AI and ML application in the machining processes across the Indian machine tool sector – as also the CAM software segment. “3D Printing and Robotics are definitely being used by MTMs as part of their manufacturing process. As far as technological gap goes, I would say that our leading machine tool manufacturers have quite a robust machining process which is on par with global standards, if not already exceeding them.”

The major area where we as an OEM witnessed over the past several years is predicting the demand forecast well in advance and plan our supply chain accordingly. “AI and Big Data can align together in predicting the needs and requirements of customers based on consumer purchase behaviour. With the demand forecast ready, 3D printers close to the demand sites can deliver complex components in just a couple of days. The best part of 3D printing is that its operators can function sitting anywhere across the globe with the highest standards of built-in security features”, adds Swapnil.

Explaining the benefits of industry 5.0 for the welding industry, Vishwanath highlights the Big five technologies – the internet of things, artificial intelligence, advanced robotic welding power sources, virtual reality and 3D printing – have unleashed competition within manufacturing and production systems, forcing companies to rethink and retool everything that they do internally. The Chief Executives and Chief Operating Officers who embrace these technologies and rapidly transform their business enterprises will set their companies growing up for success. Fronius inspires mind-opening solutions and assist companies in adaptation to these emerging technologies.

Talking about industrial automation, Sameer feels the field is rapidly advancing and will continue to see an acceleration of tighter integration of Edge intelligence, with more intuitive Human Machine Collaboration and Data Analytics. “These technologies will help manufacturers achieve a batch size one production level together with unparalleled quality and traceability to ensure better end-customer satisfaction and assist operators collaboratively to free up human time for performing more creative tasks.”

Challenges in adopting digitalised technologies for SMEs and MSMEs 

SME and MSMEs are the backbone of the national economy and already ramping up automation in the manufacturing process. “Some of the challenges that SME and MSME sector faces in adopting factory automation, digitisation and robotics are the mindset calibration in-terms of cost and complexity. There is an unsubstantiated understanding that this shift to robotics requires significant engineering and programming know-how. This is far from reality,” Subrata adds.

Lack of knowledge and understanding about digitalisation, automation, and robotics has resulted in a low percentage of Indian MSMEs adopting technologies, says Jhankar. According to the internet statistics, only 34 percent of Indian MSMEs have adopted digital means for efficient manufacturing processes. Lack of knowledge and guidance about digital tools, unknown investment cost, and lack of skilled laborers are key challenges towards adopting digital technologies in SME and MSME sectors.

Expressing concern over the adoption challenges for the SME and MSME. Amitabh says “Bringing about a cultural change in the organisation as SME/MSMEs undertake Industry 4.0 journey is a challenge and adequate efforts has to be made in training and involving employees on the shopfloor so that they own up to the initiative.”

“The need for automation, demand-supply gap, training gap, finance gap and vision gap are some of the factors that come to mind, amongst others,” explains Vineet. Many SME and MSME companies are first generation entrepreneurs, who may not have requisite guidance or the required finance to adopt these technologies from the beginning.

Explaining the challenges for the automation and 3D printing companies, Swapnil highlight that some of the key areas that industries are currently dealing with is training and development of human resource and keeping them motivated to scale up their skills as and when the market demands.

Arvind on the other side is of view that the adoption has been far more impactful in areas where there is need to increase products and options, for shorter time to market, to innovate and manage global supply networks, of constant competitive evolution, of changing customer preferences, of technologically induced influences and for better cost dynamics.

Most of them are concerned with the cost & the level of investment involved in it. The sector is wary of making big one-time investments. This could be managed by pursuing a step-by-step approach that will help them to climb the ladder of automation gradually. “However, they must have a clear vision and a proper design in place before embarking on this step-by-step approach. Tying up with a reliable automation partner who has the capability to provide complete solutions would come helpful for this. For example, quality control by experienced operators (difficult for an MSME to retain) may be replaced more effectively by an investment in a vision system”, says Sameer.

The way forward with Industry 5.0

“We are currently witnessing a growing demand for automation, not only in large companies in industries like automotive and electronics, where robotics is already in place but also in small and medium sized companies, as well as new segments, like healthcare, consumer goods, logistics and retail, which currently have a low level of robotic automation”, Subrata adds.

“Robotics is poised to have a profound impact on society; accordingly, we also need to start thinking about its implications. Though robotic systems can propose data driven decisions, they have to be coupled with the human insight to gain the maximum benefit out of a decision or process or system and also to correctly implement them in the business context, says Sangeet. Today, technology is improving at a faster rate than our education and legal system can keep up. Regulations must be put in place in what data is accessible to machines and what these machines can do. Research must be focused on directions where robotics is helpful for humanity. Most of the dangerous, repeatable, and strenuous jobs will be done by the robots, which meant humans would be left with jobs that require creativity, social and emotional intelligence, subjective decision making and human presence. Hence the current and future workforce needs to up skill continuously.

Sharing his expectation and far sight for the machine tools sector, Vineet says “Indian machine tools will certainly benefit from both Industry 4.0 and 5.0 techniques and components; right from improving machine core structure, to improved intelligence in preventive maintenance, to optimal load balancing to a host of other features.”

According to Hardik, now a day, machine tools, cutting tools, automated fixtures or surrounding objects are equipped with many sensors which means, todays big data comes from sensor than before. The availability of such vast data along with newer technology like AI, ML and connected robotics take manufacturing to a whole new level of predicted future.

Explaining the future prospects for AI and 3D printing, Swapnil says “3D printing and AI are empowering industries to stay independent from third-party vendors. This is proving to be a game-changer altogether wherein companies don’t need any vendors from raw material procurement to machining the tool and eventually transporting that to the final delivery site.”

Robots were often separated from people for safety reasons, but now, a new generation has “come out of the cage” for 24-hour shifts, working alongside human counterparts. “Advances in human–robot collaboration will increase their adoption to 25-45 percent of production tasks by 2030, beyond their use in the automotive and electronics industries. Adopting advanced robotics and AI could boost productivity in many industries by 30 percent, while cutting labour costs by 18-33 percent yielding a positive economic impact of between $600 billion and $1.2 trillion by 2025,” explains Vishwanath.

According to Aravind, “India is at the cusp of Industry 5.0, as humans and robots start to work side-by-side and even together. In today’s rapidly changing marketplace, companies have to be on top of their game by continuously innovating their products or modernising their production processes. The future holds infinite possibilities for human-machine collaboration. 

Final note 

Although Industry 4.0 is still the foremost revolution on most manufacturers’ minds, it is also important to keep an eye on the future. Technology is constantly advancing, and production must evolve with it to remain competitive. With the increase in demand for quality hands-on custom-made products, manufacturers will undoubtedly benefit from what Industry 5.0 has to offer, and perhaps it will reduce the inherent fear most production workers have concerning being replaced by automation. New skills are necessary, but the collaborative workplace will be beneficial for all in the long term.