Managing Automation - May 2008 - (Page 24)

[ COVER STORY ] Sustainable Innovation E lectric automobiles, wind power, bio-fuels, fuel-cell technology, flywheel energy storage — these are all alternative sources of energy. Where did they come from? Need, of course. “Necessity is the mother of invention,” the classical Greek philosopher, Plato, said. The green movement is pervasive these days. As a result, companies feel the need to act socially responsible, which often, out of necessity, leads to innovation. Reducing gasoline consumption in a car, for example, has engineers looking at new ways to power that piece of metal. And what about that metal? It has mercury in it. What happens when the car goes to the graveyard? These are issues Daimler, Ford, Toyota, and others are thinking about. Often, necessity takes engineers back to the drawing board. “Typically a material — like lead in metals — these materials Jim Todhunter don’t just sit there; they have a functional purpose to them,” says Jim Todhunter, CTO of Invention Machine. “Finding a replacement is a challenging thing for these companies. They have to understand how all the functional properties play in the design and production of products, and understand how alternative selections meet or don’t meet requirements.” As a result, many companies are looking for new ways to innovate in order to find that next big thing — either to fulfill consumer demand or to meet green initiatives. Invention Machines offers a product to help companies achieve the “sustainable innovation” mission: The company says its Goldfire Innovator application facilitates the idea process. “It’s bringing predictability and repeatability to product design,” says Mark Atkins, Invention Machines’ chairman, president, and CEO. It’s what Atkins refers to as “knowledge-enabled ideation,” which, he says, is the front end of PLM. “You need the ideas for the design in order to change or fix the product, or to anticipate defects,” he says. “Great innovation happens with the coherence of knowledge,” Todhunter says. By that he means proven methodologies of how to innovate things. Using semantic-based technology, Goldfire can harvest relative concepts by collaborating among engineers, tapping into internal resources, and searching external patent archives. For example, every time an engineer changes a specification on a product, that work is captured within a global index, which enables that knowledge — and experience — to be leveraged as the product evolves. Or it can result in idea validation, which accelerates innovation, moving the manufacturer toward that next ‘aha!’ moment. “Anytime you can turn the situation from being, ‘Oh, rats, we have to comply,’ to ‘Oh great, here’s a way to increase profitability or increase market reach and create competitive advantage,’ that’s a huge change,” Todhunter says. The other, and perhaps more daunting, challenge is that manufacturers also need to stay on top of what’s going on in their own supply chains. FOOTPRINTS IN THE AIR By now, you’ve probably heard of the “carbon footprint,” which is the total set of greenhouse gas emissions caused directly and indirectly by an individual, event, or organization. So, one company — for example, Wal-Mart — is responsible for the direct emissions that result from its own operations, including the use of lighting, heating, powering equipment, and running a vehicle fleet. However, the company also must be aware of what its suppliers are emitting. To take that a step further, manufacturers are indirectly responsible for the carbon that is emitted in the preparation and transport of raw materials. Unfortunately, it’s hard to understand what all of these supply chain participants are doing. As a result, companies have to engage with the supply chain in a forced and predictable manner, says Jon Bovit, vice president of strategy at Aravo Solutions Inc., a purveyor of supplier information management (SIM) software. According to Bovit, some industry studies suggest that 75% of a company’s carbon emissions come from the supply chain. Therefore, companies need to start collecting data on how their suppliers are addressing the issue. If a company is procuring products, it also might want to find out whether the supplier uses recyclable material or adheres to Energy Star ratings. “The challenge that makes this elusive is that supplier information is spread across different systems,” Bovit says. The Aravo SIM platform can help, he says, as it provides a 360-degree view of every dealing with a supplier — every e-mail, every phone call, every RFP — in one snapshot. A module called Aravo Sustain includes a framework for managing information from ERP procurement applications, such as Oracle and SAP. This module allows organizations to obtain, analyze, and manage sustainability data, such as supplier and factory regulatory compliance, toxic substance monitoring, carbon footprinting, and even labor practices. Carbon footprinting is a priority for many manufacturers today. As a result, Aravo, together with WSP Environmental Strategies, has put together a promotion to help companies measure their carbon footprint via analysis using the Aravo Sustain module, which is a software-as-a-service offering, and sure that products and their components comply. Another initiative, the Kyoto Protocol, is an international treaty intended to reduce global warming, and it has its own rules and standards that participants must abide by. Interestingly, the global nature of manufacturing means that European regulations, for example, often have a far-reaching effect. For example, U.S. manufacturers must comply with local regulations if they want to do business in areas outside the United States. “So, almost by default, there are global regulations,” WSP’s Armstrong says. “For the manufacturing industry, the challenge is to stay on top of rapid regulatory developments and make sure they manage the liabilities associated with the product.” ma May 24 2008 Photo courtesy: Invention Machine

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of Managing Automation - May 2008

Managing Automation - May 2008 Contents Take 1 Award-Winning Shoe-Maker Otabo Alters Course, Shifts Production to China IBM Partners with Universities for Cloud Computing Getting Noise in Production Under Control Incuity Embarks on a Vertical Market Strategy Foundation Intensifies OPC Standard Testing Mailbox Notes PM Roundtable Cover Story: The Business of Going Green Special Report: Night and Day Delivering on Promises Finding the Right Fit for Wireless Driving RFID Product Scan Advertiser Index Next

Managing Automation - May 2008

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