Alongside technologies like autonomous vehicles and augmented reality, smart factories or “lighthouses” are going to play a key part in the current Fourth Industrial Revolution (Industry 4.0). Lighthouses harness foundational smart technologies such as advanced machine learning (ML), artificial intelligence (AI), and the Internet of Things (IoT) to enable a sustainable way of creating goods and meeting consumer demand.
In some areas, the lighthouse manufacturing model is already supplanting the mass manufacturing framework as we know it. The Philippine industrial sector may soon follow suit, thanks to the ongoing development of the 5G networks and digital infrastructure needed to create true lighthouses.
The Benefits of Industry 4.0
Though mass manufacturing allows for the rapid and low-cost manufacturing of goods, these benefits are only achieved with scale and if demand is accurately predicted. However, it is often accomplished in ways that result in the production of waste and in negative environmental impacts. Additionally, the mass manufacturing framework makes it expensive to customize goods to meet unique needs. These drawbacks will be addressed by lighthouses and their tech-enabled processes.
The further expansion of 5G digital infrastructure will enable the creation of tech-powered lighthouses. Emerging additive manufacturing processes such as 3D printing and advanced robotics could then be part of dynamic production lines where the output is specified by customers. This could allow for true “mass customization” at low cost rather than simple mass manufacturing. Apart from direct benefits to businesses and consumers, this change may potentially reduce the industrial waste and environmental damage associated with previous generation manufacturing.
In the Philippines, the development of such facilities is likely to bring massive changes to the local industrial sector, increasing their resilience to various market trends, making businesses more sustainable, and reducing the negative ecological and social impacts of manufacturing facilities.
How the Philippines Will Join the Fourth Industrial Revolution
Today, the Philippines is well on its way to developing its first Industry 4.0 lighthouses. The country’s rapidly expanding 5G digital infrastructure network may soon enable the construction of lighthouses anywhere in the country.
Since the start of the 2020s, common tower projects such as Aboitiz InfraCapital (AIC) and Partners Group’s Unity Digital Infrastructure venture have been expanding the availability of 5G internet throughout urban centers and the Philippine countryside. These digital connectivity projects will form the foundation for tomorrow’s lighthouses, linking Philippine manufacturing facilities with businesses and homes all over the world.
The capacity and resilience of these new networks are being further improved through the use of small cell sites. These low-powered, low-cost digital infrastructure assets are designed to complement conventional macro cell infrastructure, efficiently filling connectivity gaps caused by tall buildings, geographic features, and economic restrictions. Because of their small size and low cost, they are the perfect solution for increasing data capacity in dense urban areas where macro sites would be redundant or expensive.
Why Economic Estates Are Vital for Philippine Lighthouses
Though lighthouses could be theoretically built anywhere, economic estates such as AIC’s LIMA Estate in Batangas are likely to be the homes of the country’s first lighthouses. These areas offer key advantages that, even now, make it possible to build or update facilities according to Industry 4.0 principles.
First, these estates already offer the right combination of basic utilities, 5G internet, and economic incentives to encourage the development of such facilities. Second, these facilities are located in areas that offer investors logistics and labor advantages, which brings down various business costs needed to justify the investment of new Industry 4.0 facilities. Third, these estates are already home to many existing export manufacturing facilities that are, even now, considering significant tech upgrades.
The basic benefits that enable Philippine economic estates to attract significant foreign investment also make them the perfect test bed for Industry 4.0 technologies. The low cost of operations allows forward-thinking manufacturers more leeway to try new methods and technologies that enable the mass customization and flexibility promised by the Fourth Industrial Revolution.
What Will Industry 4.0 Mean for Filipinos?
The ongoing shift in industrial frameworks will change life as we understand it. The native integration of smart technologies into industrial manufacturing is now a part of the “blurring of physical, digital, and biological spheres” envisaged by engineer and economist Klaus Schwab when he popularized the concept of the “Fourth Industrial Revolution” in 2016.
This revolution is also inevitable and it will be all-pervasive. While Industry 4.0 facilities will first come up in the economic estates, the ongoing proliferation of 5G internet will provide Philippine manufacturing facilities the necessary data bandwidth to bring the entire country into the Fourth Industrial Revolution. When this happens, the relationship between businesses and consumers and the technologies they use may become unrecognizable.
While larger players with access to new technologies and capital may initially benefit the most from the Fourth Industrial Revolution, as with prior industrial revolutions, these new capabilities will eventually empower SMEs and individuals as well.
As Industry 4.0 manufacturing requisites and smart technologies like 3D printers, broadband internet, and adaptive AI become more accessible, there is a real possibility for more Filipino entrepreneurs to create innovations and capture specific niches. As with previous industrial revolutions, many of these new capabilities will then become available to consumers. The net effects of Industry 4.0 are, thus, likely to create a completely new Filipino way of life.
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