Grant: Collaborative Research and Development Grants

Industry 4.0 is the digitization of a company's physical assets and the company's integration into digital ecosystems with its value chain partners, from suppliers to customers. It uses smart technology and the use of real-time data to increase flexibility, customization, efficiency and productivity, and to reduce time, costs and innovation cycles. Due to disruptive technologies, the digitization of processes, and an explosive growth in data, Industry 4.0 will have a major impact on the way products are designed, manufactured, assembled, shipped and repaired, and on the people that have to adapt to these changes. Industry 4.0 focuses on nine technologies: autonomous robots, system integration, the internet of things (IoT), simulation, additive manufacturing, cloud computing, augmented reality, big data, and cybersecurity. Through these technologies, new supply chain paradigms can be achieved, and production and related logistics processes will change. This will require innovation on two fronts: smart products and smart processes. It will also require substantial change to the workforce, which will need to be trained and skilled to work in an Industry 4.0 environment; this is one of the biggest challenges of Industry 4.0. Siemens Canada is partnering with Concordia University and École de technologie supérieure (ÉTS) to collaborate on research that will focus on the supply chain, with the objective of developing methodologies and tools for smart supply chain planning by leveraging the advantage of Industry 4.0 technologies. Employees are key enablers in the transition to Industry 4.0; they must be trained and qualifications need to be updated to adapt to the new interdisciplinary approach. Both Concordia University and ETS have strong expertise in these areas and are well equipped to meet the required objectives of the project. The proposed project is an important step towards preparing Canadian aerospace companies for the fourth industrial revolution. It is one of the first projects of its kind in Canada, whereby the digitization of aerospace is being considered by an OEM in a move towards Industry 4.0.*