MANUFCATURING
TRANSFORMATION
TO CHANGE NEW
ZEALAND’S ECONOMIC
TRAJECTORY
FUTUREPROOFING OUR LOCAL ECONOMY TO BRIDGE
THE GAP BETWEEN NEW ZEALAND AND CHINA
Manufacturing and automation is now more top-of-mind than ever before. As Industry 4.0 takes root in
businesses across the globe, the opportunity to embrace highly-advanced technology and new, forwardthinking
ways of working has never been greater. From smart cities and cashless payments to autonomous
vehicles, there is no shortage of buzzworthy, headline-grabbing advances in modern industry.
One innovation that has become
particularly important is intelligent
manufacturing or smart factories.
A combination of cyber-physical
systems, automation, and the
Internet of Things (IoT), these facilities have the
potential to rapidly transform business.
Therefore, it should come as no surprise that New
Zealand has identified and embraced the benefits
that this industrial wave holds. Automation
adoption among local manufacturers has picked
up substantially in recent years. The BusinessNZ
Performance of Manufacturing Index in New
Zealand jumped to 53.2 in February 2020 from
an upwardly revised 49.8 in the previous month,
beating market expectations of 50.3.
“According to Bloomberg, before the COVID-19
pandemic, many economists expected the fourth
quarter to be the low point in the GDP growth
track,” says James McKew, regional director at
Universal Robots.
Used in manufacturing in New Zealand, demand
for cobots should now increase as the country
now looks to rapidly accelerate its economy.
In addition, Universal Robots also has good
traction in the education sector in New Zealand,
which once again underpins the importance of
increasing technical competency.
CURBING ECONOMIC CONCERNS
As close economic allies, China’s halt on
production has had significant impact on the
local supply chain. Here, McKew notes that
advancements in AI and specifically, cobotics can
be used in areas where its unsafe for humans to
work or more simply workers are unwilling to do
the monotonous tasks to which cobots are so well
suited.
“One of the latest and most exciting robotic
breakthroughs, collaborative robots or cobots
– robots that work alongside human operators
safely - enable businesses to improve cost
efficiency, productivity, and output quality. These
intelligent tools foster a more inclusive workspace,
too, by relieving workers from strenuous,
repetitive and sometimes dangerous tasks so
they can focus on higher-value assignments,”
McKew adds.
Cobots are user-friendly, flexible, compact, safe,
and have a lower Total Cost of Ownership (TCO)
compared to traditional industrial robots. TCO
includes both direct and indirect costs, including
maintenance, factory floor upgrades (including
the ease a cobot can be re-deployed), employee
training, and safety barriers, all of which are
factors that typically apply to traditional industrial
robots. Cobots are also less costly to set up,
which further makes them a financially attractive
option for manufacturers across industries
turning to automation for the first time.
WHAT CAN WE LEARN FROM THE
COVID-19?
Besides finding a vaccine or a cure, automation
has now also been lauded as one of the safest
ways to bridge the gap between the virus and
service delivery.
In light of the global COVID-19 outbreak, the
opportunity exists to further understand and
implement automation across the country,
placing Australia in a stronger manufacturing
position and improving its global competitiveness
rank.
“The World Economic Forum’s 2019 Global
Competitiveness Index revealed that those
economies that have invested in innovation
capabilities are best placed to revive productivity
and weather a global slowdown,” says McKew.
INNOVATION AS A FAILSAFE
As pharmaceutical companies are gearing up
towards a possible increase in production while
new solutions come to the fore, robotics will
become a pivotal gear in the manufacturing chain.
20 June 2020
M O T O R S & G E A R S