According to an MPI Industry 4.0 study, 93% of businesses see Industry 4.0 as a competitive differentiator, yet over one-third of Industry 4.0 initiatives are somewhat or significantly over budget and are completed later than scheduled.
The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) is among the key technologies that drive Industry 4.0 transformations and we have come to recognize the importance of driving IIoT or Industry 4.0 projects with quick time to value.
SAP offers IIoT-embedded solutions for the end-to-end supply chain and operations process in order to enable intelligent products, intelligent factories and logistics, and intelligent assets while empowering people.
SAP and partners are now offering the SAP IoT starter package, which consists of rapid proof of concept and turnkey IIoT-embedded offerings to significantly speed up IIoT projects and reduce the risks associated with the digital transformations that Industry 4.0 enables.
Three common scenarios are:
Delivery Insights
SAP S/4HANA and SAP Internet of Things (SAP IoT) enable customers to trigger automated responses (business processes) and alerts, from IoT sensor input, of critical inbound and outbound delivery conditions. For example, a sales manager receives a notification on their mobile device that a shipment of temperature-sensitive food items on route to a customer is compromised because the permitted temperature threshold has been exceeded. The sales manager can then proactively respond with measures, such as initiating another delivery to safeguard customer satisfaction.
Logistics and Manufacturing Automation
Businesses can automate warehouse processes using SAP S/4HANA and SAP IoT. For example, “goods receipt” and “goods issue” of deliveries can be automatically triggered based on scanning events or to automate their Kanban process. Automating these processes has shown to have significant impact on productivity and working capital optimization. Manufacturers can improve stock levels and reduce manual efforts, thereby helping avoid human errors. Furthermore, businesses can react faster and more effectively when issues occur.
Intelligent Assets
Customers can leverage IIoT technology, through SAP Intelligent Asset Management solutions, to monitor the condition of assets by visualizing and analyzing sensor data. With this, customers can increase asset availability by empowering asset operators and service providers to predict failures early and take corrective actions. At the same time, customers can lower maintenance costs by planning maintenance schedules dynamically to improve resource utilization and reduce asset downtime.
Defining a clear scope helps SAP and partners to shorten the implementation time of a proof of concept. This means that businesses can significantly accelerate their Industry 4.0 transformation while having better control of their costs and timelines. Another advantage of the offering is that customers can choose from technology partners that have already tested and gained extensive knowledge on IIoT scenarios offered by SAP using the SAP IoT solution. Partners, including HCL and Zebra, specialize in implementation, hardware, and connectivity.
Learn more about SAP’s offering for Industry 4.0 here. To inquire about the SAP IoT starter package, contact SAP IoT Enablement here.
Anubhuti Shah is vice president and head of Design to Operate Solution Management at SAP.