I have attended a number of manufacturing events recently, including our own UK customer event. In talking to manufacturers at those events it’s struck me how the requirements for information within manufacturing is really changing.
I think it’s changing on three fronts:
- The introduction of the Millennial generation to the workplace and how they use data. These people grew up with Google, were never taught how to use an index and don’t know what an encyclopaedia is.
- The ability to use low cost analytics and cloud technology to make sense of data. Once over data storage was expensive, let alone the computing power to start analysing huge amounts of structured and unstructured data. Now this technology is available to everyone, at a very low entry level.
- The ability for the “internet of intelligent things” to capture and return huge amounts of data. Historically we were limited to data that was essentially generated by a human interface, slowly it began to move towards data also being generated by, for example, machines on the shop floor. Now literally billions of devices have sensors in them that can be connected into the “Internet of Things”.
These three changes work together to create a landscape of rapid evolution of information requirements. It’s no longer acceptable to go and hunt for information, run reports or plow through paperwork in order to “spot a pattern.” Not only is it no longer acceptable, given the amount of data now available to us, it’s no longer viable either.
That’s why at SYSPRO we are constantly driving analytics, social collaboration and intelligent devices into everything that we do.
We recognize that the next generation of manufacturers are here. They want to engage with the information in their ERP system through their other social media applications – like messenger, Skype or WhatsApp. Asking questions of the “SYSPRO Bot” and getting not only information back, but taking action too.
We recognize that data comes from many sources now, not just transactions, but intelligent devices out in the field. So we create the infrastructure around SYSPRO to hold that data and to service it up to other applications that need to access it – including cloud services that use the data, in combination with machine learning, to surface insights such as predicted failure rates, preventing downtime, spotting early quality issues or even identifying negative customer sentiment.
We understand that insight has to be surfaced, so that people can spend their time taking decisive action that will add value to their businesses. Information relating to last month is no longer sufficient – its predicting next month’s information that counts.
At the recent UK conference, SYSPRO’s Chief Innovation Officer and Chief Product Officer wow’ed our customers with what’s possible in SYSPRO now and in the coming months.
It’s certainly an exciting time to be in business. In a world of economic uncertainty, utilizing technology in order to build a realistic future scenario and prepare your business to respond to it truly gives you competitive advantage.
