Opinion: Showing 4-sight - DRAFT

Article published in the September/October edition of European Rubber Journal magazine

The latest issue of ERJ (Sept/Oct) reflects the market, regulatory and technology trends that are shaping the tire & rubber manufacturing sector and redefining its future.

A prime example is the drive to Industry 4.0, a theme that looks set to dominate K2016 – the vast, global plastics & rubber trade fair that takes place every three years in Düsseldorf.

In theory, Industry 4.0 will see every item of equipment in a tire or rubber plant closely interlinked and geared up to adjust to changes of any sort – from raw materials characteristics to feedback from end-users at the very end of the supply-chain.

However, as one analyst quipped, the tire & rubber industry “has first to get to Industry 3.0, before it starts thinking about Industry 4.0.”

While there may be more than a grain of truth in that remark, it does ignore some of the excellent work going on, often behind the scenes, within our industries.

As a material, rubber does not always lend itself so readily to the high-end mass-production seen, for instance, on plastics injection moulding and packaging lines.

But while these other industries might be ahead in the queue to embrace the opportunities presented by advanced networking, the rubber industry is not so far behind.

To prove this point, rubber moulding machinery specialist Desma has embarked on a tour of 16 countries with a roadshow to demonstrate the capabilities of its latest Industry 4.0 technologies (sse K Preview p26).

And even in the conservative tire industry, programmes are underway to introduce the IT infrastructure and networking capabilities needed to drive a flow of data from the shopfloor to the boardroom and across the entire enterprise.

As Paolo Butti of Rockwell Automation explains (see feature on p35), this information-flow is now coming, not only from the machine, but also from the tire itself.

And, he concludes, the emergence of tracking technologies, such as RFID, could change the interaction between the tire industry and the market, and how the customer chooses which tire to use, when to get it replaced and when to get it refurbished.