BY MICHAEL POWER
AHEAD OF THE CURVE
MODEX 2022 SHOW HIGHLIGHTS TRANSFORMATIONAL SUPPLY CHAIN TECHNOLOGIES Investment in innovation will rise over the next two years as nearly 80 per cent of supply chain leaders say their digital transformation accelerated during the COVID-19 pandemic. That’s according to an industry report from the Material Handling Institute (MHI), released during the MODEX 2022 conference in Atlanta recently. This year’s conference, which is held every two years, saw over 37,000 visitors at the Georgia World Congress Center. Over 857 exhibitors showcased advances in manufacturing and supply chain technology and innovation. The conference’s dominant trend was digital supply chain solutions, including automation, robotics, artificial intelligence, autonomous vehicles, augmented reality, the Internet of Things (IoT), data analytics among others. This year’s industry report, entitled Evolution to Revolution: Building the Supply Chains of Tomorrow, highlighted that push for innovation. The report gives insights into trends and technologies transforming supply chains and the priorities of those running them. REPORT RESULTS Many organizations are ready to spend big bucks to benefit from that technology. Of the 64 per cent of respondents increasing investments, two out of three said they will spend more than $1 million over the next two years. Investments are growing especially in the middle ranges from $5 million up to $100 million – where 41 22 JUNE 2022
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per cent say they spend over $5 million and 18 per cent say they will spend over $10 million. The results come from survey responses from over 1,000 manufacturing and supply chain leaders from a range of industries who were queried at the end of 2021. Overall, 81 percent of respondents hold executive-level positions such as CEO, vice-president, general manager, department head or engineering management. Participating companies ranged from small to large, with 59 per cent reporting annual sales of more than $50 million, and 13 per cent reporting $1 billion or more. This year’s report, the ninth in a series of annual industry reports published by MHI and Deloitte, provides updates on the technologies with the most potential to transform supply chains, including projected adoption rates of the next five years for each of the 11 technology categories covered and an analysis of common barriers to adoption. The technologies covered in the report are AI; predictive analytics; inventory and network optimization; robotics and automation; wearable and mobile technology; driverless vehicles and drones; 3D printing; IofT; cloud computing and storage; sensors and automatic identification; and blockchain. According to respondents, all technologies covered by the survey will hit an adoption rate of 66 per cent or higher over the next five years. Cloud computing, now the standard
platform for most supply chain software, continues to have the highest adoption rate at 40 per cent, the report says. Inventory and network optimization is expected to rise to the top over the next five years, with an expected adoption rate of 87 per cent (in a statistical tie with cloud computing at 86 per cent). However, artificial intelligence is expected to see the most accelerated growth – rising from 15 per cent to 73 per cent over the next five years, a nearly five-fold increase. Predictive analytics, at 22 per cent, is expected to grow to 82 per cent over the next five years. Industrial IoT, currently 21 per cent, is expected to grow to 80 per cent. Robotics and automation, at 28 per cent, is expected to reach 79 per cent. Robotics and automation continue to top the list of innovations that survey respondents believe have either the potential to disrupt the industry (17 per cent) or to create competitive advantage (39 per cent). Yet a handful of other technologies are close behind, including predictive and prescriptive analytics; sensors and automatic identification; autonomous vehicles and drones; and AI technologies. While hiring and retaining qualified workers has been the top supply chain challenge in the past, this year saw disruptions and shortages at the top with 57 per cent – presumably due to the pandemic. Talent issues (54 per cent) and customer demands (51 per cent) remain priorities, but in the context of avoiding disruption. SUPPLY PROFESSIONAL
2022-06-20 2:34 PM
