Manufacturers now have the ability to create digital twins of their factories, optimising layout and streamlining processes, without the need for costly physical changes.
As Deepu Talla, vice president of robotics and edge computing at NVIDIA, explains, "AI for manufacturing is here. Every factory is becoming more and more autonomous due to the transformational impact of generative AI and digital twin technologies."
Major Taiwanese electronics manufacturers, such as Delta Electronics, Foxconn, Pegatron, and Wistron, are already adopting NVIDIA's technology to build robotic facilities. For example, Foxconn develops digital twins of it’s factories. This allows Foxconn's teams to optimise equipment layout for operational flow and AI cameras that monitor worker safety. Additionally, the factory digital twins serve as virtual training environments for simulating, testing, and validating autonomous mobile robots (AMRs) and AI robot manipulation arms.
Young Liu, CEO and chairman of Foxconn, states, "AI and robotics are poised to revolutionise manufacturing, enhancing safety on factory floors and driving significant operational efficiencies… we can create sophisticated digital twins of our factories to train robots, optimising workflows with unprecedented precision and reducing costs."
Integration into existing factory infrastructure requires significant investments in both hardware and software. Additionally, ensuring the interoperability of various AI systems and traditional manufacturing equipment is complex and time-consuming. But with the strive for incremental improvement to remain competitive the pay off, for some at least, may be worth it.