5G technologies are a key component to implementing smart factories. In this blog you will find Microsoft’s vision for smarter, safer factories and how they drive value from a business perspective. You can also learn how Microsoft thinks about smart factories from a technical perspective in a section that explores how the combination of 5G technology, edge devices, and the cloud create a new application paradigm.
A vision for smarter, safer factories
Manufacturing is critical for individuals, businesses, and the economy—it’s how ideas turn into reality, converting raw materials into finished products that get distributed and consumed all around the world. The manufacturing production process is complex, with an inherent need to adapt quickly and adjust production lines whenever the component of a product or the product itself changes. These environments require precision and coordination between people and machines to produce and process end goods while ensuring product quality and employee safety.
Many manufacturers are now looking to increase their digital investments and accelerate the adoption of emerging technologies. Executives see technologies like robotics and automation, data analytics, and the Internet of Things (IoT) as key to enabling more agile, resilient processes.
In the future, connected factory technology will reshape how quickly and effectively manufacturers operate. With automated approaches enabled by artificial intelligence (AI), manufacturers will be able to optimize the performance of both machines and employees, minimizing downtime and human error while maximizing production capabilities and employee safety. This is the vision for smart factories.
While no two manufacturing facilities are the same, a smart factories approach provides substantial opportunities across a common set of value drivers applicable in most facilities:
- Increasing production line operational efficiency and quality
- Reducing downtime
- Enhancing standard operating procedure (SOP) execution
- Improving frontline worker communication, management, and safety
The key to implementing smart factories is connectivity. Factories face unique challenges in terms of connectivity—they often operate across many indoor and outdoor spaces, all housing a variety of connected devices. And smart factory use cases like product quality control and smart surveillance require a high volume of images, video, and data to be instantly computed and analyzed across manufacturing environments.
A smart factory built with 5G technology enables the instant event detection and alerting that are key to ensuring manufacturers can act quickly and efficiently to correct any production issues and enforce safety measures. Adopting 5G for one use case also unlocks other possibilities that rely on real-time, mission-critical connectivity—now and in the future.
At Microsoft, we are deeply committed to 5G technology. 5G is not just a new network standard—it is a technological breakthrough helping to create a new application paradigm that empowers organizations to solve complex problems with network-intelligent applications.
To learn more about the business value behind smart factories, get our smart factories business case document, which explores the use case, value drivers, technology, and total cost of ownership in more detail.
The combination of 5G technology, edge devices, and the cloud create a new application paradigm
At the heart of smart factories are modern connected applications that require higher network capacity and speed, ultra-reliability, and low latency to support mission-critical functions in real time. The impressive connectivity of 5G technology enables intelligence at the edge that powers these applications with instant adaptability to adjust to changing conditions in real-time while unlocking innovation at scale as the applications include more devices across complex environments like factories.
While 5G provides impressive connectivity, it’s only one side of the equation. Smart factories depend on significant compute power to support the analytics required to derive insights from all the collected data. This computing can occur either in the cloud, or closer to the source—referred to as “the edge.”
Edge devices are critical to enabling low-latency communications. For mission-critical scenarios like smart factories, where real-time detection and alerting are key, reducing latency to milliseconds is essential. With a cloud backend, data from across the factory can also be aggregated together to improve the AI models at the edge and identify deeper insights that affect your entire infrastructure.
To help implement smart factories today, Microsoft has developed a Smart Factories Technical Design and Architecture Guide, which walks through the key considerations and components of the application infrastructure, application architecture, and network infrastructure that are all a part of our smart factories vision.
The guide also provides information to help you familiarize yourself with the concepts and components of 5G networking and edge computing. You’ll be able to see different options and recommendations for how to approach those technologies based on the needs of your unique infrastructure. Additionally, the document provides an overview of the factory-specific devices, including cameras and sensors, needed for smart factories today.
Get the technical guide to learn more about the design and architecture.
It’s time to get started with 5G
The vision for smart factories is here, and Microsoft has resources that can help you get started on building modern connected applications using 5G, edge computing, and the cloud today. You can use the links below to learn more about smart factories and other use cases, access developer resources, or connect with a Microsoft representative.
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Learn |
Download the business case and technical design guide for deeper understanding of the value drivers and technical approach for smart factories |
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To find out more about how 5G technology is powering digital operations, download the Digital Operations Signals study. |
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Learn more about our vision for 5G in a blog post by Microsoft Corporate Vice President Martin Lund |
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Learn more about how 5G is opening up new opportunities in other industries like smart roads and smart airports |
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Develop |
Read more about how to create your own modern connected application using the solution accelerator and upskill with the 5G Cloud Skills Challenge |
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Build your own Private 5G network with the 5G Starter Kit |
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Connect |
Connect with a Microsoft expert to get started with a proof of concept or to learn about total cost of ownership for 5G use cases |
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Sign up for news and updates on 5G Modern Connected Applications |
