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Recently, the World Economic Forum released the latest batch of global “lighthouse factories” list, a total of 18 selected, including 8 Chinese factories. So far, the number of global “lighthouse factories” has reached 132, including 50 in China, ranking first in the world. first place.

It is understood that the newly added lighthouse factories have a common strategic focus, which is the recognition that advanced technology must be promoted throughout the operation process.

Enno de Boer, senior partner and global head of digital manufacturing at McKinsey & Company, said: “We congratulate all Lighthouse factories for their successful adoption of Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies and the progress they have made in scaling them up. As the fourth industrial revolution enters a new stage of development, enterprises can no longer be satisfied with partial transformation, but should carry out large-scale promotion in multiple factories, involving tens of thousands of employees. They implement special Govern strategies intelligently and deploy multiple business and consumer-focused use cases across multiple factories and value chains, unlocking growth potential.”

According to the World Economic Forum, compared with non-lighthouse factories, lighthouse factories are three times more likely to use Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies to develop their production networks, and 50% more likely to complete scale expansion ahead of schedule.

The reasons for the 8 Chinese factories on the list are as follows:

ASE Semiconductor (China Taiwan, Kaohsiung): In order to improve production efficiency and shorten lead times, while coping with increasingly complex production processes (100 process steps), ASE Semiconductor’s Kaohsiung bump factory has deployed multiple processes from inspection to scheduling. AI application, thereby increasing production by 67% while reducing order delivery time by 39%.

Fii (Shenzhen, China): In response to customer demand for fast release of new smartphone products and meeting strict quality standards, Fii achieved agile products by deploying 37 4th Industrial Revolution technology use cases at scale Launch, rapid capacity ramp-up, and intelligent mass production shorten time-to-market for new products by 29%, speed up capacity ramp-up by 50%, reduce quality failures by 56%, and reduce production costs 30%.

Haier (Hefei, China): As the supplier network continues to expand, in order to meet the challenges of product diversity, delivery time and product quality, the factory utilizes a customized industrial 18 different use cases of Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies have been deployed in areas such as services to accelerate AI,machine visionAnd the large-scale application of advanced analytics technology, which ultimately cut the order delivery time in half and reduced the field defect rate by 33%.

Shanghai Huayi Advanced Materials (Shanghai, China): In response to challenges such as 30% overcapacity and rising costs due to market volatility, the company deployed 28 4IR advanced use cases, such as machine learning-driven process optimization andAIDriven safety management has successfully increased labor productivity by 33%, reduced unit processing costs by 20%, reduced energy consumption by 31%, and reduced the number of safety accidents to zero.

Lenovo (China, Hefei): In response to fierce market competition, severe demand fluctuations and increasing demand for product customization, Lenovo’s Hefei factory, as the world’s largest single personal computer factory, has deployed more than 30 fourth Industrial Revolution flexible automation and advanced analytics use case, increased production efficiency by 45%, reduced supplier quality issues by 55%, while effectively managing uncountable small orders (80% of orders are under 5 devices ).

Mondelēz (Suzhou, China): In order to achieve the goal of quadrupling China’s retail channels and doubling the number of retail stores to 4 million, and to cope with double-digit inflation caused by rising labor and logistics costs, the Companies investing in multiple Fourth Industrial RevolutionsDigitizingThe solution, transforming a linear supply chain into an integrated supply ecosystem, increased OTIF by 18%, reduced delivery time by 32%, and increased market share from 23.4% to 28.3%.

Unilever (Tianjin, China): Over the past three years, Unilever has deployed more than 30 use cases of Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies such as tailor-made 7*24-hour digital sales model, optimized end-to-end advanced planning, and artificial intelligence-driven quality control system, thereby accelerating market penetration in low-tier cities, doubling the number of customers, and shortening order delivery time 40%, reducing customer complaints by 62%.

Wistron (Zhongshan, China): The company is under pressure to deliver 60% of its orders in less than 72 hours and to speed up the end-to-end process without compromising excellent quality. To this end, Wistron deployed 33 technology use cases in factories to transform the entire value chain. Despite the shortage of supply, by adopting the fourth industrial revolution technology, the production capacity per unit hour was increased by 32%, the defect rate was reduced by 55%, the delivery time was shortened to 48 hours, and the unit production cost was finally reduced up 22%.

Lighthouse Factory Helps Get Rid of Macroeconomic Headwinds

As the highest honor in the global manufacturing industry, “Lighthouse Factory” is not only a medal for commending advanced manufacturing enterprises, but also a goal pursued by many manufacturing enterprises.

To be selected as a “Lighthouse Factory”, it needs to have a clear value creation for the industry.In terms of manufacturing cost reduction, production efficiency improvement, and environmental protection and sustainability, it is necessary to integrate at least five world-class leading technology applications and build a scalableIndustrial InternetA platform that supports large-scale replication of use cases. In addition, a matching digital management model, talent team and corporate culture are required.

Specifically: First, we must focus on digital production, and gradually realize the digitalization of the entire value chain from R&D, procurement, manufacturing, logistics, supply chain and customer service; Excellent improvement results, such as production efficiency, energy consumption, speed to market, etc.; third, it must be replicable, and can be replicated and promoted in multiple factories to promote the transformation and upgrading of its production, management, and R&D.

In 2022, the new crown epidemic has had a profound impact on all walks of life. Supply chain disruptions, soaring inflation, rising interest rates, looming economic recession and increasing geopolitical turmoil have seriously disrupted factory production operations. However, some “lighthouse factories” have mastered how to promote advanced technology on the manufacturing network, showing other factories how to escape the above-mentioned adverse macroeconomic factors.

Francisco Betti, Director of the World Economic Forum’s “Advanced Manufacturing and the Future of Value Chains” Platform, said: “By integrating Fourth Industrial Revolution technologies in their operations, the Lighthouse Factory will improve its output, cost and lead time. achieved double-digit growth in efficiency. In this new phase of the Fourth Industrial Revolution, these factories are serving as role models across industries, showing how to work across manufacturing networks, suppliers and customers, as well as functions such as procurement, logistics and R&D. Promote the use of advanced technology.”