LNS Research reviewed dozens of Connected Frontline Worker (CFW) vendors, ranking Augmentir as the leading CFW solution innovator.
Efforts to enable the frontline industrial workforce through connected worker and other digital technologies have become increasingly common over the past several years, recently, LNS Research found that over half of industrial organizations globally have undertaken Connected Frontline Workforce (CFW) initiatives. CFW has become a strategic part of Industrial Transformation (IX) initiatives as manufacturers seek to solve critical labor shortages, skills gaps, and retention issues in frontline operations.
CFW-enabling technologies hold the promise of helping companies meet their frontline workforce challenges while optimizing operational performance across safety, quality, and productivity dimensions. However, industrial business and technology leaders must navigate the uncertain waters of the relatively immature and highly fragmented CFW Applications market to capture the opportunity fully.
From their extensive analysis, LNS Research has created the CFW Applications Solution Selection Matrix™ (SSM) – a comprehensive guide intended to help manufacturers better understand, evaluate, and even select from a shortlist of Connected Frontline Worker technology vendors.
LNS Research reviewed dozens of vendors within the CFW ecosystem and categorized them based on various key criteria, including product capabilities, market potential, and company presence. Augmentir was named by LNS Research as a leading CFW solution innovator in their SSM.
Augmentir positioned as a leading front runner and innovator
According to LNS Research, Augmentir is well-positioned for future growth, with a trajectory that gives it the potential to be among a small set of likely market leaders in the Connected Frontline Worker (CFW) Applications space. This assessment is based partly on the strength of differentiated capabilities of its AI-enabled solution suite to enable proactive, data-driven performance improvement, personalization of work execution support and training, and the integration of individual and team skills and qualifications to guide workforce development and shift-specific work assignment.
Other key factors impacting Augmentir’s potential are the strength and proven experience of the leadership and management teams, strong momentum in the market, a record of successful product innovation, ecosystem partnerships, and likely continued access to adequate funding and resources to support the expansion of go-to-market initiatives. Augmentir’s track record indicates a strong likelihood of continued growth and the potential over time to be among a select group of market leaders in the CFW Applications space.
Manufacturers are using connected frontline worker solutions as a foundation to their industrial transformation strategy to empower their employees with real-time, actionable data; driving better decision-making and improving safety, training, and more.
Leading manufacturers that deployed Augmentir’s AI-driven, smart, connected worker solution have seen impressive results, such as:
75% reduction in new hire training/onboarding time
27% reduction in machine downtime using Autonomous Maintenance
32% improvement in worker productivity
In addition to the above results, our customers have seen quality, safety, and productivity increases across all operations, as well as increases in employee retention and reductions in operating costs associated with employee churn.
If you are interested in learning why LNS Research ranked Augmentir as the leading connected worker solution in the market, reach out to us and request a live demo.
The evolution of AI in manufacturing has seen tremendous growth over the past few decades, now becoming more adaptive and collaborative, and being used to augment and directly support frontline workers.
The evolution of artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies in manufacturing has seen tremendous growth over the past few decades, with astounding leaps in technology and industry-wide transformations.
Dating back to the 1960’s, manufacturers started using AI in robotics and basic automation. This early usage focused on automating manual, highly repetitive human tasks such as assembly, parts handling, and sorting, allowing for higher levels of production and efficiency.
Over time, this evolved with AI-enabled machine vision systems, which were used to automate visual inspections, allowing for better quality control and precision during production cycles. More recently, AI has been at the center of warehouse automation, as well as the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), where physical machines and equipment are embedded with sensors and other technology for the purpose of connecting and exchanging data, which is used in predictive analytics for machine health monitoring. Manufacturers can now glean valuable insights from data collected over time about optimizing their operations for maximum efficiency without sacrificing quality.
Despite the breath of applications that AI has in the industrial setting, there is a common thread across all of the above examples – AI has largely been used to automate highly repetitive or manual tasks, or perform functions designed to replace the human worker.
However, these examples laid the groundwork for the adoption of AI in manufacturing and for the use of AI technologies that augment and directly support frontline workers today.
Read below for more information on how the use of AI and GenAI is evolving in manufacturing, and being used to augment the human worker, transforming productivity and efficiency at a time when workforce optimization is needed most.
Using AI to Augment, not Replace the Workers in our Factories
Today, AI technologies in manufacturing have evolved to encompass a diverse range of applications. According to Deloitte, 86% of surveyed manufacturing executives believe that AI-based factory solutions will be the primary drivers of competitiveness in the next five years. Robotics and automation have become more adaptive and collaborative, working alongside and augmenting human workers to streamline production processes and increase efficiency – rather than simply trying to replace them.
As computing power and algorithmic capabilities improved, AI in manufacturing has become more advanced and widespread. The emergence of Industry 4.0, characterized by the convergence of digital technologies, further accelerated AI’s role in manufacturing. By leveraging tools like connected worker solutions to gather frontline data, manufacturing organizations can now capitalize on AI’s extraordinary computing power to analyze that data and derive actionable insights, improved processes, and more.
Much like the industry has learned to optimize equipment from the 1.7 Petabytes of connected machine data that is being collected yearly, we are now able to optimize frontline work processes and people from highly granular connected worker data, with one major caveat: In order to leverage this incredibly noisy data, a system has to be designed with an AI-first strategy, where the streaming and processing of this data is intrinsic to the platform – not added as an afterthought.
The potential for AI to help augment the human worker is there, but why now?
Because for today’s manufacturers, time is not on your side.
The workforce crisis in manufacturing is accelerating, and at the forefront of the minds of Operations and HR leaders. Job quitting is up, tenure rates are down, and manufacturers struggle daily to find the skilled staff necessary to meet production and quality goals. The threat is huge – with significant impacts to safety, quality, and productivity.
AI-based connected worker solutions allow industrial companies to digitize and optimize processes that support frontline workers from “hire to retire”. These solutions leverage data from your connected workforce to optimize training investments and proactively support workers on the job, across a range of manufacturing use cases.
Furthermore, solutions that leverage Generative AI and proprietary fit-for-purpose, pre-trained Large Language Models (LLMs) can enhance operational efficiency, problem-solving, and decision-making for today’s less experienced frontline industrial workers. Generative AI assistants can leverage enterprise-wide data, provides instant access to relevant information, closes skills gaps with personalized support, offers insights into standard work and skills inventory, and identifies opportunities for continuous improvement.
Augmentir’s AI-First Journey
At Augmentir, since the beginning, we pioneered an AI-first approach toward manufacturing and connected frontline worker support.
Many manufacturing solutions incorporated AI technology as an add-on or afterthought as the technology gained more advanced capabilities and popularity. We, however, have been championing and building a suite of solutions using AI as a foundation. Our platform was designed from the bottom up with AI capabilities in mind, placing us as a leader in the connected frontline worker field.
2019 – Augmentir launched the world’s first AI-first connected platform for manufacturing work empowering frontline workers to perform their jobs with higher quality and increased productivity while driving continuous improvement across the organization. This marked the start of our AI-first journey, giving industrial organizations the ability to digitize human-centric work processes into fully augmented procedures, providing interactive guidance, on-demand training, and remote expert support to improve productivity and quality.
2020 – Augmentir unveiled True Opportunity™, the first AI-based workforce metric designed to help improve operational outcomes and frontline worker productivity through our proprietary machine learning algorithms. These algorithms take in frontline worker data, then combine it with other Augmentir and enterprise data to uncover and rank the largest capturable opportunities and then predict the effort required to capture them.
2021 – Building on user feedback and field data, Augmentir reveals True Opportunity 2.0™, with improved and enhanced capabilities surrounding workforce development, quantification of work processes, benchmarking, and proficiency. By Leveraging anonymized data from millions of job executions to significantly improve and expand the platform’s ability and automatically deliver in-app AI insights we were able to increase benefits and returns for Augmentir customers.
2022 – Augmentir announces the release of True Productivity™ and True Performance™. True Productivity allows industrial organizations to stack rank their largest productivity opportunities across all work processes to focus continuous improvement teams at the highest ROI and True Performance determines the proficiency of every worker at every task or skill enabling truly personalized workforce development investments.
2023 – Augmentir launches Augie™ – the GenAI-powered assistant for industrial work. By incorporating the foundational technology underpinning generative AI tools like ChatGPT, we enhanced our already robust offering of AI insights and analytics. Augie adds to this, improving operational efficiency and supporting today’s less experienced frontline workforce through faster problem-solving, proactive insights, and enhanced decision-making.
2024 – As this year progresses, we have already continued to refine our AI-first solutions and apply user feedback and additional features to best support frontline industrial activities and workers everywhere.
2025 and beyond – True Engagement™, looking forward we predict the evolution of AI in manufacturing activities will continue, progressing until we can accurately measure signals to detect the actual engagement of industrial workers and derive useful information and insights to further enhance both HR and manufacturing processes.
We are deeply involved in applying AI and emerging technologies to manufacturing activities to augment frontline workers, not replace them. Providing enhanced support, access to key knowledge (when and where it does the most good), and improving overall operational efficiency and productivity.
The Future of AI in Manufacturing – The Journey Forward
As we press onward into the future, we at Augmentir are determined to champion the application of AI and smart manufacturing to augment and enhance frontline workers and industrial processes. We will continue to evolve our application of AI and its use cases in manufacturing to help frontline teams and workforces, reinforcing our AI-first pedigree.
The addition of Augie to our existing AI-powered connected worker solution is an important step forward. Augie is a Generative AI assistant that uses enterprise-wide data, provides instant access to relevant information, closes skills gaps with personalized support, offers insights into standard work and skills inventory, and identifies opportunities for continuous improvement. Augie is a result of our dedication to empowering frontline workers, leveraging AI to support manufacturing operations, and giving manufacturing workers better tools to do their jobs safely and more efficiently.
With patented AI-driven insights that digitize and optimize manufacturing workflows, training and development, workforce allocation, and operational excellence, Augmentir is trusted by manufacturing leaders as a industrial transformation partner delivering measurable results across operations. Schedule a live demo today to learn more.
https://www.augmentir.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/evolution-of-ai-in-manufacturing.webp6301200Chris Kuntzhttps://www.augmentir.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Augmentir_Logo_Sm-300x169.pngChris Kuntz2024-03-23 02:00:412025-01-13 12:01:40The Evolution of AI in Manufacturing
AI is playing a key role in changing the manufacturing landscape, augmenting workers and empowering them with improved, optimized processes, better data, and personalized instruction.
Deloitte recently published an article with the Wall Street Journal covering how AI is revolutionizing how humans work and its transformative impact. They emphasized that AI is not merely a resource or tool, but, that it serves almost as a co-worker, enhancing work processes and efficiency. This article discussed how the evolving form of intelligence augments human thinking and emphasized this as a catalyst for accelerated innovation.
Manufacturing is uniquely situated to benefit from AI to improve operations and empower their frontline workforces. The skilled labor gap has reached critical levels, and the market is under tremendous stress to keep up with growing consumer demand while staying compliant with quality and safety standards. Manufacturing workers are crucial to the success of operations – maintenance, quality control and assurance, and more – manufacturers rely upon their workforce to ensure production proceeds smoothly and successfully.
AI is playing a key role in changing the manufacturing landscape, augmenting workers and empowering them with improved, optimized processes, better data for informed decision-making, troubleshooting, personalized instructions and training, and improved quality assurance and control. According to the World Economic Forum, an estimated 87% of manufacturing companies have accelerated their digitalization over the past year, the IDC states 40% of digital transformations will be supported by AI, and a recent study from LNS Research found that 52% of industrial transformation (IX) leaders are deploying connected worker applications to help their frontline workforces. Not only that, AI technology is expected to create nearly 12 million more jobs in the manufacturing industry.
Integrating AI into manufacturing not only enhances productivity, but also opens the door to new possibilities for worker safety, training, and innovative new manufacturing practices. Here are some ways AI is transforming manufacturing operations:
AI-based Workforce Analytics: Collecting, analyzing, and using frontline worker data to assess individual and team performance, optimize upskilling and reskilling opportunities, increase engagement, reduce burnout, and boost productivity.
Personalized Training in the Flow of Work: With AI and connected worker solutions, manufacturers can identify and supply training at the time of need that is personalized to each individual and the task at hand.
Personalized Work Instructions: AI enables manufacturers to offer customized digital work instructions mapped to their skill levels and intelligently assign work based on each individual’s capabilities.
Digital Performance Support and Troubleshooting Guide: Generative AI assistants and bot-based AI virtual assistants offer support and guidance to manufacturing operators, enabling access to collaborative technologies and knowledge bases to ensure the correct actions and processes are taken.
Optimize Maintenance Programs: AI algorithms analyze data from sensors on machinery and other connected solutions to predict when equipment is likely to fail. This enables proactive maintenance, minimizing downtime and reducing maintenance costs. Additionally, with AI technologies, manufacturers can implement autonomous maintenance processes through a combination of digital work instructions and real-time collaboration tools. This allows operators to independently complete maintenance tasks at peak performance.
Improve Quality Control: AI-powered solutions can improve inspection accuracy and optimize quality control and assurance processes to identify defects faster. With connected worker solutions, manufacturers can effectively turn their frontline workforce into human sensors supplying quality data and enhancing assurance processes.
Ensure Worker Safety: AI-driven safety systems coupled with connected worker technologies monitor the work environment, supplying real-time data and identifying potential hazards to ensure a safer workplace for employees.
As AI continues to advance, the manufacturing industry is poised for even greater transformation, improving both the quality of products and the working conditions for employees. AI is revolutionizing the way humans work and how the manufacturing industry approaches nearly every process across operations, augmenting work interactions, productivity, efficiency, and boosting innovation.
https://www.augmentir.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/ai-revolutionizing-how-humans-work-in-manufacturing.webp6301200Chris Kuntzhttps://www.augmentir.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Augmentir_Logo_Sm-300x169.pngChris Kuntz2023-09-21 13:00:582025-01-13 11:59:52AI: Revolutionizing How Humans Work in Manufacturing
Learn how to digitize your operations and build a paperless factory in this paperless manufacturing guide from Augmentir.
Manually managing and tracking production in manufacturing has become a thing of the past. That’s because manufacturers are adopting a new digital approach: paperless manufacturing.
Paperless manufacturing uses software to manage shop floor execution, digitize work instructions, execute workflows, automate record-keeping and scheduling, and communicate with shop floor employees. More recently, this approach also digitizes skills tracking and performance assessments for shop floor workers to help optimize workforce onboarding, training, and ongoing management. This technology is made up of cloud-based software, mobile and wearable technology, artificial intelligence, machine learning algorithms, and advanced analytics.
More recently, your journey to paperless manufacturing is being accelerated through the availability of generative AI assistants and supporting import tools that can streamline the conversion of existing content into interactive, mobile-ready content for your frontline teams.
Paperless manufacturing software uses interactive screens, dashboards, data collection, sensors, and reporting filters to show real-time insights into your factory operations. If you want to learn more about paperless manufacturing processes, explore this guide to learn about the following:
A paperless factory uses AI-powered software to manage production, keep track of records, and optimize jobs being executed on the shop floor. Paperless manufacturing is intended to replace written record-keeping as well as paper-based work instructions, checklists, and SOPs, and keep track of records digitally.
For example, in most manufacturing operations, everything from quality inspections to operator rounds and planned and autonomous maintenance is done on a regular basis to make sure factory equipment is operating properly and quality and safety standards are met. In most manufacturing plants, these activities are done manually with paper-based instructions, checklists, or forms.
Operators and shop floor workers in paperless factories use software to execute work procedures and see production tasks in ordered sequences, which enables them to implement tasks accordingly. Workers are able to view operating procedures, or digital work instructions, using mobile devices (wearables, tablets, etc.) in real-time.
Furthermore, paperless manufacturing incorporates the digitization of shop floor training, skills tracking, certifications, and assessments. This digital approach uses skills management software helps optimize HR-based processes that were previously managed via paper or spreadsheets, and includes the ability to:
Create, track, and manage employee skills
Instantly visualize the skills gaps in your team
Schedule or assign jobs based on worker skill level and proficiency
Close skill gaps with continuous learning
Make data-driven drive operational decisions
What are the benefits of going paperless in manufacturing?
There are a number of reasons for factories to go paperless, from cost-effectiveness to increased productivity and sustainability. A paperless system can revolutionize production processes, workforce management, and business operations.
Here are the top benefits of going paperless:
Accelerate employee onboarding: By digitizing onboarding and moving training into the flow of work, manufacturers can reduce new hire onboarding time by 82%.
Increase productivity: Digitizing manufacturing operations means no more manual, paper-based data collection or record-keeping. Workers have more time to run their equipment, execute shop floor tasks, and find solutions to problems.
Boost data accuracy: People are prone to making mistakes, but digital data capture and validation can help offset human error and improve accuracy.
Improved workforce management: Digital skills tracking and AI-based workforce analytics can help optimize production operations and maximize worker output.
Manage real-time operations: Human-machine interface systems eliminate the need for paper, files, and job tickets. This means that workers can analyze inventory and other data in real-time.
Save money: Although going paperless means that the cost of paper is eliminated, the savings extend beyond that. With greater productivity, operations in real-time, and improved production optimization, costs can be reduced in many areas.
How do you go paperless in manufacturing?
Going paperless starts with digitizing activities across the factory floor to increase productivity, and extending that value through a digital connection between the shop floor and enterprise manufacturing systems. We lay out below the four basic steps for how to go paperless in manufacturing:
Step 1: Digitize your existing content with Gen AI and Connected Worker technology.
Paperless manufacturing starts with the use of modern, digital tools that can quickly and easily digitize and convert your existing paper-based content. Tools like Augmentir’s Augie™, a generative AI suite of technologies, helps you import and convert existing content regardless of format. Once converted, Connected Worker solutions that incorporate enhanced mobile capabilities and combine training and skills tracking with connected worker technology and on-the-job digital guidance can deliver significant additional value. A key requirement to start is to identify high-value use cases that can benefit from digitization, such as quality control or inspection procedures, lockout tagout procedures, safety reporting, layered process audits, or autonomous maintenance procedures.
Pro Tip
You can now import existing PDF, Word, or Excel documents (just like the PDF above) directly into Augmentir to create digital, interactive work procedures and checklists using Augie™, a Generative AI content creation tool from Augmentir. Learn more about Augie – your industrial Generative AI Assistant.
Step 2: Augment your workers with AI and Connected Worker technology.
AI-based connected worker solutions can help both digitize work instructions and deliver that guidance in a way that is personalized to the individual worker and their performance. AI Bots that leverage generative AI and GPT-like AI models can assist workers with language translation, feedback, on-demand answers, access to knowledge through natural language, and provide a comprehensive digital performance support tool.
As workers become more connected, companies have access to a rich source of job activity, execution, and tribal data, and with proper AI tools can gain insights into areas where the largest improvement opportunities exist.
Step 3: Set up IoT sensors for machine health monitoring.
The industrial Internet of Things (IoT) uses sensors to boost manufacturing processes. IoT sensors are connected through the web using wireless or 4G/5G networks to transmit data right from the shop floor. The use of machine health monitoring tools along with connected worker technology can provide a comprehensive shop floor solution.
Step 4: Connect your frontline to your enterprise.
Digitally connected frontline operations solutions not only enable industrial companies to digitize work instructions, checklists, and SOPs, but also allow them to create digital workflows and integrations that fully incorporate the frontline workers into the digital thread of their business.
The digital thread represents a connected data flow across a manufacturing enterprise – including people, systems, and machines. By incorporating the activities and data from these previously disconnected workers, business processes are accelerated, and this new source of data provides newfound opportunities for innovation and improvement.
Augmentir provides a unique Connected Worker solution that uses AI to help manufacturing companies intelligently onboard, train, guide, and support frontline workers so each worker can contribute at their individual best, helping achieve production goals in today’s era of workforce disruption.
Our solution is a SaaS-based suite of software tools that helps customers digitize and optimize all frontline processes including Autonomous and Preventive Maintenance, Quality, Safety, and Assembly.
Transform how your company runs its frontline operations. Request a live demo today!
https://www.augmentir.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/09/paperless-manufacturing-augmentir.webp6301200Chris Kuntzhttps://www.augmentir.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Augmentir_Logo_Sm-300x169.pngChris Kuntz2023-09-20 14:12:392024-12-20 15:31:21Paperless Manufacturing: Your Guide to Transitioning to a Paperless Factory
Learn how Digital Standard Work effectively transforms manufacturing production and enables operational excellence.
Manufacturing organizations are feeling the pressure of increased customer demands, skilled labor shortages, and intense shifts in their frontline workforces, however, they can effectively overcome these obstacles with digital standard work enabled by smart connected worker technology. Digital standard work promotes operational excellence in manufacturing through facilitated knowledge-sharing, enhanced process standardization, increased employee engagement, improved workforce agility, and overall optimization of workforce abilities.
Standardized work in manufacturing (centerlining, machine setup/maintenance, inspection checklists, workforce training, lubrication procedures, etc.) is effective for continuously improving the most efficient and safe methods for performing work to meet customer demand while minimizing waste. Digital Standard Work takes these processes one step further, enhancing them with digital technology to establish a true culture of continuous improvement where frontline workers and shop floor processes benefit from digital workflows, collaboration, AI-powered guidance, generative AI assistants, real-time access to centralized knowledge bases, and more.
By redefining standard work for the digital age, manufacturers can achieve operational excellence through increased efficiency, quality, flexibility, and innovation across their frontline workforces. Read more on Digital Standard Work and how it effectively transforms manufacturing production and enables success:
According to Forbes and McKinsey, through digital tools manufacturers can reduce machine downtime by 30% to 50% and quality-related costs can be reduced by 10% to 20%. Effectively digitizing manufacturing standard work through smart, AI-driven connected worker technology involves:
Interactive Digital Work Instructions Replace paper-based standard operating procedures (SOPs) with interactive digital work instructions that include multimedia elements like videos, images, and animations. These can be accessed by workers on tablets, wearables, and other mobile devices right on the shop floor.
Data Capture and Integration Leverage smart tools and sensors to automatically capture data from the manufacturing process, such as torque values, cycle times, and quality checks. This data can be integrated into the digital work instructions to provide real-time feedback and ensure adherence to standards.
Workflow Automation Automate non-value-added tasks like data entry, approvals, and documentation through connected worker platforms. This streamlines workflows, reduces errors, and frees workers to focus on value-adding activities aligned with standard work.
Knowledge Management Digitize and centralize tribal knowledge, best practices, and process documentation in a connected worker platform. This ensures standardized methods are easily accessible and updatable for consistent knowledge sharing across the workforce.
Using smart, connected worker platforms to digitize and optimize standard work in manufacturing drives improved productivity, ensures better and more consistent product quality, and fosters a safer work environment for enhanced operational success. Connected worker platforms that digitize standard work can also be used to support a company’s broader IWS (integrated work systems) strategy, which helps improve operational excellence in manufacturing.
Pro Tip
Using a low-code no-code workflow builder simplifies the creation of complex digital workflows for frontline work processes. Furthermore, integrating remote collaboration tools facilitates real-time guidance, knowledge sharing, and the ability to update standard work procedures based on captured tribal knowledge.
Engaging Frontline Workers with Digital Standard Work
As manufacturing workforces shift due to retirement and tribal knowledge loss, effective workforce training has become critical for continued success. Interactive digital interfaces, augmented and enhanced capabilities, and wearable technologies make standard work practices like workforce training more engaging and accessible, improving workforce adoption and adherence.
Digital tools facilitate information visibility and knowledge sharing among frontline workers, enabling them to learn from each other, share best practices, and contribute to a culture of continuous improvement. By tracking and analyzing performance data from digital systems, manufacturers can identify top performers, provide personalized feedback, and recognize achievements, fostering a sense of engagement and motivation among frontline workers.
Digital Standard Work empowers frontline workers by involving them in process improvements, recognizing their contributions, and providing opportunities for learning and growth, leading to increased job satisfaction and commitment. By leveraging digital technologies and interactive interfaces, manufacturers can transform Standard Work procedures into engaging and empowering experiences for their frontline workforce, driving productivity, quality, and a culture of continuous improvement.
Most importantly it gives manufacturing frontline and factory staff the tools they need to be successful and thus create a more satisfied environment where employees come to work and feel good about what they are doing and how they are doing it.
Driving More Effective Collaboration
Digital standard work also facilitates better collaboration across your frontline teams. Effective communication starts with digital tools, and by implementing digital standard work with connected worker technology, manufacturers can connect frontline team members across shifts, departments, locations, and languages, improving visibility into workforce planning, training, skills tracking, daily management, troubleshooting, and more.
From frontline workers to executives, a digital standard work strategy that leverages connected worker technology allows employees to collaborate seamlessly and easily access information. Connected worker solutions that include industrial collaboration tools allow workers to virtually connect to subject matter experts for remote guidance and assistance. These software tools are becoming commonplace in manufacturing and other industrial settings, where companies are faced with an increasingly distributed and remote workforce, yet still require team collaboration to help troubleshoot and resolve issues. In a nutshell, workers can get more done with greater accuracy in less time.
Interested in learning more?
If you’d like to learn more about how Augmentir and our AI-powered connected worker solution digitizes standard work, streamlines operations, improves communication, and empowers frontline workers with the tools and information they need, schedule a demo with one of our product experts.
https://www.augmentir.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/07/digital-standard-work-in-manufacturing.webp6301200Chris Kuntzhttps://www.augmentir.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Augmentir_Logo_Sm-300x169.pngChris Kuntz2024-07-04 11:33:422024-12-19 15:33:03How Digital Standard Work Promotes Operational Excellence in Manufacturing
Say hello to the newest addition to the Augmentir platform, Augie – the GenAI powered digital assistant for manufacturing.
Say hello to the future of work in manufacturing with the latest addition to Augmentir’s suite of connected worker tools, Augie™.
Augie is a digital assistant for frontline operations that utilizes Generative AI and proprietary fit-for-purpose, pre-trained Large Language Models (LLMs) to enhance operational efficiency, problem-solving, and decision-making for today’s less experienced frontline industrial workers. It leverages enterprise-wide data, provides instant access to relevant information, closes skills gaps with personalized support, offers insights into standard work and skills inventory, and identifies opportunities for continuous improvement.
Augie is a result of our dedication to empowering frontline workers, leveraging AI to support manufacturing operations, and giving manufacturing workers better tools to do their jobs safely and more efficiently.
Continue reading below to learn more about how Augie works and how it can benefit your frontline workforce and manufacturing operations:
Generative AI-powered smart manufacturing assistants are designed to provide secure, role-based, personalized assistance to frontline workers, engineers, and managers in various industries, including manufacturing.
They work by leveraging artificial intelligence and integrations across different software systems, providing guidance and assistance in various tasks to enhance productivity and performance. This includes providing data insights, recommendations on actions to improve performance, and the ability to create analyses and dashboards with a natural language-based assistant.
A majority of smart manufacturing assistants only draw their information from manufacturing execution systems (MES), without tying in other important systems necessary for frontline manufacturing success.
Augie, however, is different. It leverages enterprise-wide data tying in information from a wide range of platforms including operational data, training and workforce management data, connected worker and engineering data, as well as information from enterprise systems.
How Augie Benefits Your Frontline Workforce
Augie is unique among other smart manufacturing assistants. It leverages proprietary fit-for-purpose, pre-trained LLMs and generative AI, coupled with robust security and permissions, to help factory managers, operators, and engineers improve efficiency, resolve issues faster, and prevent downtime.
With information readily available via Augie, frontline workers can make decisions faster, reduce downtime, and improve troubleshooting with instant access to summarized facts relevant to a job or task. Additionally, Augie is multi-modal, meaning it can return actionable information in the form of work procedures, training videos, recorded collaborations, engineering documents and SOPs, as well as tribal knowledge.
Through Augie, manufacturers can instantly:
Close skills and experience gaps with personalized support
Gain insights into Leader Standard Work
Gain new insights into skills inventories
Convert Tribal Knowledge into Digital Corporate Assets
Identify opportunities for continuous improvement
Forecast potential operational issues
With Augie by your side, you can streamline manufacturing operations, optimize performance, empower your frontline workforces, and stay ahead in today’s rapidly evolving and competitive landscape.
Improve Operational Efficiency with Augie and Augmentir
The digitization of frontline processes has become a must-have to keep up with the velocity of change – but not just digitization … smart digitization. Recently, Deloitte found that 86% of manufacturing executives believe smart factory solutions will be the primary drivers of competitiveness in the next five years. Leveraging smart, AI-driven connected worker solutions that allow industrial organizations to best support their frontline workforces and optimize processes to make them safer and more efficient is critical to overall enterprise success.
At Augmentir, we have been met with continued success in our efforts to transform manufacturing operations. Our patented Smart AI foundation helps manufacturing organizations close the loop between training and work execution, delivering the data and in-line insights necessary to continuously improve operational excellence day-over-day, year-over-year. Augmentir is the world’s leading connected worker solution, combining smart connected worker and GenAI technologies to drive continuous improvement and enhance performance management initiatives in manufacturing.
The addition of Augie to our platform is a game-changer for factory floor and other frontline workers, allowing for quick reference troubleshooting and useful, contextualized information to be delivered at the moment of need. Furthermore, with Augie, less experienced workers are provided with additional support and individualized guidance based on the job or task needs.
With patented AI-driven insights that digitize and optimize manufacturing workflows, training and development, workforce allocation, and operational excellence, Augmentir is trusted by manufacturing leaders as a digital transformation partner delivering measurable results across operations. Schedule a live demo today to learn more.
Explore how to digitize Operator Driven Reliability (ODR) programs and processes with an AI-powered Connected Worker Platform for improved efficiency, accuracy, and better results.
Operator Driven Reliability programs, a.k.a. ODR programs, empower frontline operators to take an active role in equipment maintenance and reliability. It recognizes that due to operators’ constant contact with equipment, they are the best situated to detect any potential issues and take preventative steps before any damage is caused.
While ODR programs are forward-thinking and apply the same lean manufacturing principles found in autonomous maintenance, in many cases they still have room for improvement. For example, in too many instances manufacturing ODR programs are still completed using outdated pen-and-paper procedures. This causes tasks like plant operator rounds to take far longer than they would if reports, checklists, and work instructions were digitized and delivered via a smart connected worker platform.
Then not only would equipment maintenance and reliability be streamlined and faster, but there would also be a digital footprint available for operational activities like process improvement, data analysis, audit reporting, and more. Read below to discover the benefits of a digital ODR program, including best practices, real-world examples, and insights into the future of ODR and workforce dynamics in manufacturing.
Digital Operator Driven Reliability (ODR) programs offer significant advantages over traditional pen-and-paper methods. AI-driven connected worker platforms play a crucial role offering integrations with existing systems like ERP, CMMS, MES, and QMS, supporting ODR training with guided support and tutorials, encouraging continuous improvement through performance tracking and digital skills assessments, and even facilitating enhanced industrial collaboration with real-time communication and cross-shift knowledge-sharing.
Further benefits of a digital ODR program include:
Enhanced Data Collection and Analysis: Connected worker platforms allow for real-time data capture from operators on the condition of equipment and AI-driven analytics are able to identify trends, offer actionable insights, and predict potential issues.
Digital Workflow Optimization: Digital work instructions and checklists optimize and streamline tasks and procedures, standardizing ODR activities, and automating task assignments and reminders for an increase in efficiency and accuracy.
AI-Driven Insights and Decision Making: AI-powered tools coupled with data collected through connected worker platforms offer visibility into the frontline workforce like never before, enabling better workforce intelligence, informed decisions about equipment maintenance and reliability, predictive maintenance based on historical data, and more.
Digital Documentation and Compliance: Digital forms and checklists offer automatic logging of ODR activities and equipment interventions, easy access to up-to-date standard operating procedures (SOPs), and digital audit trails for regulatory compliance. Overall, digitizing the documentation processes for ODR programs ensures better accountability and regulatory adherence.
Pro Tip
With AI-driven connected worker technology, manufacturers can effectively digitize their ODR programs, significantly enhancing equipment reliability, reducing downtime, and improving overall operational efficiency in manufacturing environments.
Digital Operator Driven Reliability – Best Practices and Examples
Implementing a digital ODR program helps manufacturers empower frontline operators, engaging workers with an active role in equipment maintenance and reliability, leading to reduced downtime, improved productivity, and better overall equipment performance.
Below are some best practices and industry examples of digital ODR programs in real-world situations.
Best practices for digital ODR programs:
Implement robust data collection and analysis systems
Provide mobile accessibility for operators
Use digital work instructions and checklists
Enable real-time communication and collaboration
Integrate with existing systems (ERP, EAM, CMMS, MES)
Leverage AI-powered analytics and predictive maintenance
Offer digital training, knowledge management, and skill development tools
Autonomous Maintenance Checklist
Free Template
Standardize your autonomous maintenance routines with our free Autonomous Maintenance Checklist Template. Download our PDF template to get started, and learn more about digitizing your autonomous maintenance process with Augmentir.
Chemical Manufacturing Plants – Refinery and chemical operators conduct regular valve inspections and adjustments, using digital operator round planning tools to schedule routines and automate notifications.
Food and Beverage Production – Packaging line operators inspecting sealing mechanisms for proper operation can log equipment condition data into digital systems, clean and lubricate equipment fittings, and provide observations to maintenance teams supported by digital media assets like pictures and videos.
Pulp and Paper Mills – Operators conduct regular visual inspections of the Fourdrinier wire (the mesh screen that forms the paper sheet) for signs of wear, damage, or misalignment and use, using digital checklists to streamline and standardize inspection processes and document any minor repairs or adjustments made during their shift.
Through digital ODR practices, manufacturing frontline operators can help detect early signs of problems, maintain optimal machine performance, and contribute to reduced downtime and improved product quality.
The Future of ODR Programs and the Manufacturing Workforce
Manufacturing currently faces a series of crises, ranging from a severe shortage of skilled workers to an insurmountable increase in customer demand – industrial organizations are working hard to keep their facilities producing and their heads above water while still maintaining industry standards.
Many manufacturers continue to experience high frontline worker disengagement and attrition rates, a recent study by The Manufacturing Institute and PwC stated that more than one-third of manufacturers reported high turnover rates, while only 58% carried out proper frontline employee engagement initiatives.
Using AI-driven connected worker platforms to digitize programs like ODR that incorporate frontline operators and engage them in meaningful tasks using their expertise is the best path forward for manufacturing organizations regardless of their industry focus. These platforms allow for quick adoption of new processes and adaptation of current processes based on market needs/demands. They support frontline workers like never before, giving them access to tools like generative AI assistants and expert knowledge and guidance at a moment’s notice.
The future of manufacturing lies in the hands of the next generations of workers and it’s the responsibility of industrial organizations to equip them with the right tools to keep them safe and ensure they can carry out their duties effectively.
Interested in learning more?
To learn more about digitizing Operator Driven Reliability (ODR) and how to transform your frontline manufacturing activities with our AI-powered connected worker platform – schedule a demo with one of our product experts.
https://www.augmentir.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/11/operator-driven-reliability.webp12602400Chris Kuntzhttps://www.augmentir.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Augmentir_Logo_Sm-300x169.pngChris Kuntz2024-09-15 17:09:102024-11-20 01:59:23How to Digitize Your Operator Driven Reliability (ODR) Program with Connected Worker Technology
The latest Frost & Sullivan Radar report recognizes Augmentir as the Leading Augmented Connected Worker Platform.
Augmented Connected Worker (ACW) solutions revolutionize manufacturing and industrial operations and Augmentir is leading the way!
The recent Frost & Sullivan Radar report recognized Augmentir as the Leading ACW Solution with our AI-powered connected worker platform. AWC is a concept that combines the methodologies behind connected worker and augmented worker initiatives to provide a clearer, more accurate picture of what the future of manufacturing work looks like.
Read below to learn more about Augmentir in the Frost Radar report and how ACW technologies benefit both manufacturers and their workers alike.
The Frost & Sullivan Augmented Connected Worker Radar Report 2024
The Frost & Sullivan Radar Report, or Frost Radar™, is an analytical tool that benchmarks the future growth of leading organizations across multiple industries. Through careful selection and research across criteria that encompasses 2 major indices and 10 evaluation criteria, analysts select organizations that will be able to successfully support users into the future.
This edition of the Frost Radar, ranked Augmentir #1 out of all the ACW vendors. Augmentir empowers organizations to embrace Augmented Connected Worker initiatives through a comprehensive platform that combines connected worker and AI technologies to connect and support frontline workers like never before.
As manufacturing workers become more interconnected, they can use AI tools in conjunction with smart connected worker solutions to gain insights that pinpoint areas with significant potential for improvement, this allows them to truly augment their workforces equipping them with the knowledge and abilities to complete their work safely and competently.
For more information on the Frost Radar, and the evaluation methodology used by Frost & Sullivan, click here.
Augmentir Ranked #1 Connected Worker Platform, Most Complete Solution on the Market
Frost & Sullivan has identified nine functionalities that are essential for a complete ACW solution.
Knowledge and data management. The solution serves as a repository of knowledge.
Work assistance and productivity. It provides digital tools to enhance frontline workers’ tasks, such as digital work instructions, digital Kanban boards, and navigation guidance.
Seamless experience. The solution must be easily accessible from available devices (phones, tablets, wearables) to integrate seamlessly into everyday operations.
Skills management. This serves as an extension for learning management systems (LMS) and provides supervisors and plant managers the necessary tools to upskill the workforce.
Channel for communication. The solution offers native features to enable collaboration across operations, such as remote assistance, multi-site or multi-team workflows, and news feeds.
Reporting and analytics. This refers to pre-built dashboards with workforce and task execution data. The ACW platform can also provide tools for configuring custom dashboards and integrating data from other systems.
Integrations. The solution comes with a variety of pre-built connectors and tools to easily build new integrations to common systems.
Platform capabilities. NC and LC development environments allow the building of digital procedures, workflows, training programs, and dashboards. Standard templates are available to accelerate time to value and the default deployment option is cloud-based.
Integrated AI. The solution leverages AI in one or more ways. AI-enabled features include predictive maintenance, automatic creation of workflows/digital work instructions/troubleshooting procedures based on video or worker input, automatic analysis and optimization recommendations for processes, AI-powered search engines, copilots, live translations, and more.
Frost & Sullivan ranked Augmentir as a Leader in both innovation and growth within the ACW solution landscape.
According to Frost & Sullivan:
Augmentir offers one of the most comprehensive ACW solutions in the market. Its new AI copilot sets it apart from most other products in the market by covering a variety of use cases. The company’s plans to leverage engagement data from the workforce is a unique initiative in the current market. All these factors contribute to making Augmentir the leader in the Frost Radar Innovation Index.
Augmenting Frontline Workers with an AI Platform for Connected Work
Manufacturing is uniquely situated as an industry to benefit from Augmented Connected Worker solutions leveraging AI-powered connected worker technology for process improvements, quality, management, enhanced training, and more. ACW initiatives facilitate faster onboarding, increased workforce flexibility, and the retention of essential knowledge.
AI – including generative AI tools, software, and assistants – plays a crucial role in ACW initiatives, addressing overarching trends like skills variability and the loss of tribal knowledge within the workforce. It serves as the cornerstone for implementing data-driven improvements in operational performance and continuous enhancement.
At Augmentir, we believe that a connected worker platform’s purpose goes beyond just delivering instructions and remote support; it should continually optimize the entire connected worker ecosystem and augment the capabilities of frontline workers. With this in mind, we introduced Augie™ – our generative AI assistant for industrial work, in early 2023.
With Augie, manufacturers can unlock previously untapped potential in their frontline personnel and operations. Our recent expansion and enhancements now offer the first-ever suite of dedicated GenAI assistants for manufacturing enterprises covering anything from Troubleshooting, Operations, and Data Insights, to Content Creation and even GenAI-as-a-Service.
Interested in learning more?
If you’d like to learn more about Augmentir and see how our AI-powered connected worker platform enables Augmented Connected Worker initiatives to improve safety, quality, and productivity across your workforce, schedule a demo with one of our product experts.
