This case is a workshop exercise built with SmarterChains, an Industry 4.0 enterprise intelligence platform. It is a complement to a class session on Industry 4.0, a difficult subject to teach as it comprises dozens of technologies that are evolving rapidly and whose use cases can be difficult to immediately grasp without concrete examples.
Often, the managerial challenges of digital transformation are underemphasized in both the classroom and for practitioners. Through the concrete example of a consumer goods factory, this workshop encourages students to consider the managerial challenges of building an Industry 4.0 roadmap while illustrating concrete use cases for several key technologies.
The students are given information about the current state of the factory. and are provided with around 30 cards describing potential technologies the factory could choose to apply. Working in groups, they are asked to select up to 10 technologies to apply, in a sequence of their choosing.
The students can then share their proposed roadmaps, as well as comparing theirs with the one proposed by SmarterChains. The case is supplemented by videos to provide context.
Learning Objective
Students will connect the technologies and managerial challenges of an Industry 4.0 implementation roadmap through a group exercise. They see a typical factory starting point and the basic considerations that must be weighed to build a roadmap.
They will also learn several key Industry 4.0 applications, selecting the right ones from a complex array of possibilities, and confront the challenge of sequencing steps to gain buy-in of personnel and harvest the benefits of implementation.
