Industrial Transformation Blog

The #MondayMusings Industrial Transformation blog series provides insight and analysis for executives from the previous week’s briefings, events, and publications @LNSResearch.

Recently, SAS invited LNS Research to its annual North American analyst event in Naples, Florida. SAS is a leading analytics, BI and data management software provider with several of LNS’ manufacturing clients using the analytics solutions to generate deeper insights into quality. The event was a great opportunity to dig deeper into SAS’ Internet of Things (IoT) and quality solutions, understand the breadth of SAS outside the industrial space, and engage with their executive team.

It’s been several years since an early wave of innovators began investing in digital technologies to improve quality. In fact, quality improvement and improved quality monitoring are one of the top use cases for Industry 4.0. The ranks of digital, IT, operations, product development, and quality leaders focusing their digital energies and resources on quality improvement is quickly growing .

LNS Research was recently briefed on the late-January release of ETQ Reliance 2019. A lot has changed at ETQ since the private equity firm TCV acquired it in August 2017. Much of the management team has changed, with seasoned industry veterans replacing long-time ETQ insiders, exceptions being the former head of ETQ Cloud, Joseph Randazzo, and ETQ co-founder, Morgan Palmer. The new leadership has brought a new philosophy, including a broader perspective on the value, role, and contributors to quality and quality technology.

Another year comes to an end! I hope you attained your personal and professional goals this year. I had an exciting year with LNS Research; we launched research on...

• Successful new product introduction (NPI) in the digital era,
  
  
• Selecting Quality 4.0 technology to drive differentiation, and
  
  
• How to converge safety, risk, quality, operations, and design for reliability.

We also examined the quality and Quality 4.0 trends in pharmaceuticals, medical devices, and automotive industries and developed frameworks and approaches for success. LNS also conducted multiple onsite quality advisory sessions and workshops for technology vendors and manufacturers. Additionally, we launched two new surveys, led two executive roundtables (thank you to the hosts Newell Brands and Whirlpool), and presented at several corporate events including ASQ’ Quality 4.0 Forum.

Ideally, compliance is part of your strategy, but not your entire strategy.  It's not enough to produce a safe product, that works as intended, and meets regulatory requirements.  Today’s quality leadership must contribute to the firm’s reputation, competitive standing, profitability, and growth.  Adding to the burden, your company’s industry, target market, role in the supply chain, size, and so many other factors intensify the pressure.  Yes, it’s a complex web of codes, guidelines, standards, and practices that companies face:

In mid-2017, LNS Research identified that an early but significant group of manufacturers had begun to recognize Quality 4.0 as one of their top Industrial Transformation initiatives. LNS coined the term Quality 4.0 and defined the space - why to adopt Quality 4.0, and how to build a successful strategy. Over time, the interest in Quality 4.0 has continued to accelerate, and many manufacturers are now either investigating Quality 4.0 or deploying early pilots .

On Thursday, November 15, LNS Research hosted the webcast, “Driving Performance in Life Sciences: Making Industrial Transformation Real with Quality 4.0 Technology.” The presentation explored how life sciences manufacturers can build a successful Quality 4.0 project to drive Industrial Transformation and gain competitive advantage.

In the 18 months since LNS coined Quality 4.0 and provided the definitive frameworks, manufacturers throughout the supply chain, across industries, and of varied company sizes have aggressively pursued Quality 4.0 technology and use cases. Today, 64% of manufacturers are pursuing Digital Transformation, and of these, 23% are pursuing quality improvement use cases. A low hanging fruit, Quality 4.0 is one of the top use cases of Digital Transformation initiatives.

On Tuesday, September 18, LNS Research hosted the webcast, “Unlocking Value from Shop Floor to the Enterprise: Digitally Transforming Risk, Quality and Safety.” The presentation explained how integrating the critical functions of quality and safety can mean strategic value for the enterprise beyond the sum of what they offer separately. The discussion included an examination of how industrial organizations use advanced digital technologies to transform risk, quality, and safety management to deliver unprecedented value from the shop floor and throughout the enterprise .

Many quality leaders have recognized that imbuing a culture of quality is critical to achieving quality objectives and desired outcomes. In fact, LNS Research identifies that 37% of quality leaders (n=1198) cite a lack of quality culture as the top roadblock to achieving quality objectives. Naturally, culture initiatives are common and emphasize that the corporation must transition to a more proactive quality approach. One critical element to culture initiatives is early and effective engagement in new product introduction (NPI). However, most of the market lacks early and effective engagement of quality processes, insights, and competencies within NPI, and quality teams often struggle to justify a change .