IBM gains SBR TEA's 2021 prize for augmented and virtual reality - manufacturing

IBM's 5G Industry 4.0 Project utilised the strengths of the 5G Industry in changing the 4.0 technology and solutions landscape.

IBM works with companies to co-create a roadmap to customised solutions that focus on leveraging existing OT investments, improving key metrics, and using people that know best.

Recently, the company was honoured at the SBR Technology Excellence Awards 2021 in the augmented and virtual reality - manufacturing services category for bringing 5G to the forefront of Industry 4.0 technology and solutions.

Industry 4.0 is revolutionising the way companies manufacture, improve and distribute their products. Manufacturers are integrating enabling technologies, including the Internet of Things (IoT), cloud computing and analytics, and AI and machine learning into their production facilities and throughout their operations. This allows for increased automation and the employment of smart factories informed by data to produce goods more efficiently and productively.

IBM's “Leveraging 5G in Industry 4.0” project focuses on the implementation of 5G—or 5th generation mobile network technology—and how it changes the architecture and deployment model in Industry 4.0 technology and solutions. This project aims to accelerate industry transformation, test the next-level performance of 5G-enabled Industry 4.0 solutions, and contribute to the vision to transform the Singapore industry ecosystem for the future of 5G.

Working with partners IMDA, Samsung and M1, the project has a 16-month-tenure that will end in June 2021. Therefore, it is important for businesses to come forward to try the 5G solutions before the end of the project in June.

This goal is divided into three different phases:

• The first phase focuses on the facility build-up, along with the 5G Infrastructure and equipment setup. Also, radio network testing was conducted to test the network setup and initial performance.
• The second phase focuses on the solution and features development which is suited for the 5G environment. Another key activity in the 2nd phase is the benchmarking test between 5G and the existing WiFi infrastructure
• The final phase will be 5G Solutions Roll-out, which focuses on bringing the solutions to the market.

1. Roll out successful technologies to IBM manufacturing sites in USA, Mexico and Hungary. This will make Singapore a leading Hub for 5G solutions development and showcase for the world.
2. Successful solutions will be commercialized both locally and abroad, and deployed in operations across a range of markets and sectors. Will share insights with enterprises, small and medium-sized Singapore manufacturers.

Some of its key achievements include:

• Automated visual inspection using AI for image recognition and video analytics, integrated with a robot arm and AGV (automated guided vehicle). The main benefit in this area is the reduction of edge devices that brings these features by pushing the processing to the edge computing server.
• Improved equipment monitoring and predictive maintenance using AI-enabled acoustic analytics. This is the main benefit of enabling the audio binary streaming to the edge computing server.
• Assembly and debugging using augmented reality to improve productivity and quality. This improvement is brought about through the dynamic model loading, allowing multiple instructions to be loaded on the fly as needed by any step in the process.

Successful 5G-enabled Industry 4.0 use-cases developed from this partnership project could be demonstrated for manufacturing enterprises and applied to production, service, quality control, and testing across a broad range of industries.

5G’s capabilities such as faster data transfer and a more rapid response time, when coupled with other transformative technologies like AI, can enable significant improvements to manufacturing processes.

The Technology Excellence Awards, presented by Singapore Business Review, was held via studio award presentations and video conferencing sessions throughout the second and third week of April.

This year’s nominations were judged by a panel consisting of Daryl Pereira, Head of Cyber at KPMG; Cheang Wai Keat, Partner, Consulting at Ernst & Young Advisory Pte. Ltd.; Henry Tan, Group Chief Executive Officer and Chief Innovation Officer at Nexia TS; Sivakumar Saravan, Senior Partner at Crowe Singapore; Cecil Su, Director, Head of Cybersecurity of BDO Singapore.

If you would like to join the 2022 awards and be acclaimed for your company’s exceptional technological innovations, please email Jane Patiag at jane@charltonmediamail.com.