Industrial artificial-intelligence (AI) challenges still prevalent

It may be surprising, but the majority of manufacturing companies haven’t yet adopted artificial intelligence to make their operations more efficient.

Possibly equally surprising: Many of the manufacturers that have enlisted industrial artificial intelligence have yet to see the payback expected.

About half of projects at the proof-of-concept (POC) phase aren’t delivering, but even in later-stage projects, that percentage remains at about 50%, said Alex West, principal analyst of IoT for Omdia, during a panel discussion on AI and industrial IoT at Industrial AI Summit.

With industrial AI, manufacturers can better understand product inventory on hand in a warehouse or gain insight into the location of a truck on the road.

But many companies have yet to take the leap that would enable these kinds of efficiencies.

“Many companies are still struggling to just connect sensors and understand really what AI is and especially how to deploy it in their operations,” said West, who moderated the session.

The hype of industrial AI can make it simultaneously too alluring and unapproachable.

Panelists agreed. “AI seems to be a magic stick or a black box,” saidTarun Rana, corporate senior manager fordigital transformation at consumer goods company Henkel.

But there are serious possibilities with industrial AI, he said.

Rana said that AI has begun to help industrial environments move toward lights-out manufacturing: fully automated manufacturing, with no human intervention.

Why Industrial AI Projects Fail to Launch

But most organizations are still struggling to just present the business case to senior management.

Failure to launch industrial IoT analytics projects is also attributable to the fact that many manufacturing organizations still haven’t adopted IoT platforms to analyze their data.

Indeed, use of IIoT platforms is low but growing. Only 10% of industrial enterprises used IIoT platforms to improve factory operations in 2020, according to Gartner, which predicts the number will climb to 50% by 2025.

To read the complete article, visit IoT World Today.