
The industrial evolution reached by now the "version" 4.0 has led companies to the increasingly automated and technological production plants that produce a large amount of data, the "Big Data". But what are they and why are they so important for an SME?
"Big Data" are the data, information, that are created by machines, sensors, production plants and circulate inside and outside the companies.
According to Mckinsey Global Institute, today more than 30 million are already networked and the number increases by 30% year by year.
Big Data's importance and truthfulness doesn't depend on quantity, but on their quality and the use that is done with them. The flow of data grows in speed and variety and we need to understand how to store them, which ones are important to monitor our plant and which ones to schedule the future work of the company. In 2001, Doug Laney (then Vice President and Service Director of Meta Group) briefly described Big Data in three categories - the 3Vs:
Over the years two new V's have been added:
In recent years, Big Data has been called the new petroleum or the new gold because their priceless source of value has finally been understood. It is thanks to them and their use that the entrepreneur can:
However, limiting itself to the collection of data, it doesn't guarantee to have all the necessary information and above all to extract knowledge from them. When we talk about data, information or knowledge we are talking about different aspects but in relation to each other.
The information is therefore the result of a process of analysis so; if Big Data is to be transformed into useful awareness in business processes to improve performance and quality, it is necessary to use Analytics tools. A sixth V has therefore been added in the evaluation of Big Data: the value. It is here that Big Data Analytics methodologies become fundamental to extract value, which will serve the entrepreneur to make more informed, timely and informed decisions:
Predictive maintenance is just an evolution of the data analysis we have talked about: through the use of Big Data and Machine Learning techniques you can check in real-time what happens in your company, but also foresee possible failures or production defects.
Research carried out by Digital Innovation in SMEs at Politecnico di Milano showed that in 2020 only 26% of Italian SMEs were ready to challenge world markets thanks to the use of production processes. The research has allowed to define 4 digital profiles of Italian SMEs:
As we have seen Big Data owned by an entrepreneur are many and always growing and it is not possible to manage them alone. In order to make the best use of them you must therefore choose and use the best tool for your business needs and rely on a partner who knows how to exploit this mine of information by supporting the entrepreneur and his team in this path towards the future of the industry.
FMECA is a widely used technique for a quantitative definition of the criticality of your production plant.
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