It is common wisdom that Labour is cheap India while it is expensive in advanced, rich countries like Germany. In fact, wages of Industrial workers in Germany are 40 times more in Dollar terms & 15 times more in PPP (Purchasing Power Parity).

It would therefore be rational to assume that German factories need Smart Manufacturing including Automation MUCH more than Indian factories.

I however argue that India needs Smart Manufacturing MORE than Germany. WHY?

In Germany, a machine operator is called a ‘Machinist’. He/She is:

·        Well Educated

·        Well Trained

·        Well Respected

·        Well Paid.

In India, a machine operator is classified as ‘Labour’ and He is:

·        Poorly Educated

·        Poorly Trained

·        Poorly Respected

·        Poorly Paid.

RESULT: POOR Quality, Productivity & Machine Maintenance

This sad situation in India is because of various cultural, political & other factors which are difficult to change. Moreover Change will take time. In Germany, an Engineer will choose to be a Machinist, but in India, an Engineer will happily apply for a peon’s job in a government department but not operate a machine.

WHAT is the solution?

Adopt Smart Manufacturing that takes away the need for ‘Skill’ to generate desired quality, productivity and also prevent machine breakdowns. There are many, many people in India who are ‘hungry for work’ but not possessing skills. Like ‘Chandu’ the unemployed former Dhabha waiter.

Training & Skilling Institutes are too few and very general in nature to be able to meet the specific needs of individual industries and are inaccessible to ‘Chandu’. By adopting smart manufacturing, Industries can hire well motivated but unskilled workers like ‘Chandu’ and get high productivity & quality from day one…and gradually skill them as they work.

WHICH Smart Technologies enable above solution?

The THREE ‘Low Hanging Fruits’ of Industry 4.0 are the most affordable & fastest implementable smart technologies. These are:

1. CLOUD BASED MACHINE MONITORING allows seamless transfer of operational data of machines to cloud based software that sends real time alerts & reports to authorized persons at any location. This allows ‘Visibility into machine shops‘ for senior managers, while removing a layer of supervisors who manually collected & processed data earlier. This ‘pure’ & ‘real time’ data ensures that ‘Chandu’ works satisfactorily & gets regular feedback.

2. AUTO-GAUGING OF MACHINED JOBS & AUTO-CORRECTION OF CNC MACHINES. This is also called ‘Closed Loop’ Manufacturing and ensures that near zero defect production can be done by ‘Chandu’ without need of inspectors to check his work.

PREDICTIVE MAINTENANCE TECHNOLOGY allows maintenance teams to be alerted BEFORE a problem occurs in a machine OR immediately after an accident takes place. ‘A stitch in time, saves nine’ and actions taken in time ensure that problems are solved while they are relatively small.

This has two immediate benefits:

· If ‘Chandu’ makes a mistake and machine suffers accident, supervisors & maintenance team can resolve issues & check process capability to ensure that production quality does not deteriorate.

· Guide & train ‘Chandu’ so that the mistake is not repeated.

CONCLUSION: While ‘Skilling’ Institutes & Training Centres are making laudable efforts, what they are producing is a ‘drop in the ocean’ and insufficient to make India an Industrial super-power.

Smart Manufacturing urgently needs to be adopted by Indian Industry to ensure world class quality & productivity, and give gainful employment to ‘Chandu’ and crores of his unskilled brothers & sisters.