The Grand Societal Challenges generate the need for a wide range of products that should be manufactured at an affordable price. Manufacturing is therefore a key enabler technology to realise these products and solutions.
Examples of this include:
- Sustainable mobility requires the availability and cost-effective integration of new and affordable propulsion systems including hybrid/electrical solutions, and specifically new battery technologies. Correspondingly factories of the future will feature increasing flexibility with multi-propulsion production lines, maximizing the exploitation of plant capacity, implementing a high level of workplace ergonomics and safety, while using advanced materials, power micro-electronics, etc.
- Improved recycling (re-manufacturing) solutions that address scarcity through the re-use of valuable materials in a cost effective way requires completely new types of factories. The scarcity of raw materials will mean that products of the future will have to be recycled to retrieve valuable materials.
- Better home care for the elderly requires smarter electronic products which require the consumption of fewer materials and energy resources during their production. Key parts will become substantially smaller, while increasing automation is introduced by competing regions (e.g. Asia). Time, cost and quality require that these products be manufactured in Europe, close to the consumer and in urban environments. Furthermore, better medical care will include highly individualised pharmaceuticals produced, on demand, through advanced manufacturing in urban-pharmaceutical factories.
- Sustainable energy through solar, wind and tidal power solutions and energy storage, requires advanced and competitive manufacturing capabilities. This will enable Europe to generate more sustainable energy and increase its energy-independence.
The ‘Factories of the Future’ roadmap connects the Grand Societal Challenges with the manufacturing capabilities required within Europe to address them. In this context, key enabling technologies (KETs), including photonics, micro and nano-electronics, industrial biotechnology, and nano-materials, will be required to support the introduction of future products in the years ahead.
The driving forces for new products are at the same time global (consumer electronics, connectivity, telecommunications, mobility, big data intelligence, solid state lighting…) and local, where local regulations and local market needs will push for products with specific requirements in a specific geographic area. In the European market, new specific requirements are arising due to environmental focus (e.g. green labelling, reduction of material waste), due to the new needs of the aging society and due to the customisation and personalisation of goods.
Global competition requires the launch of new products with a shortened commercial life cycle and with a high degree of personalisation for adapting to individuals biometric parameters or for satisfying unique users’ preferences. On the other side, sustainability is pushing for an extension of the life cycle itself. This dilemma can be solved by highly personalised products through software functionalities, which can easily sustain high frequency of renewal, or by the design of products, processes and systems that allow the sustainable re-manufacturing and materials recycling
Most of the industrial sectors which are crucial to maintaining manufacturing and jobs in Europe face the need to innovate products through the use of new materials and/or new functionalities, requiring manufacturing approaches that fully exploit the improved functionality and versatility of design.
Service provisioning and enhanced functionalities in future products will also require the introduction of increased product intelligence, such as the increased use of embedded mechatronics in components, which will require the design and production methodologies to evolve as a consequence.
Last but not least, the future factories themselves are to be considered as future products, including the consideration of user (worker) –experience in their design.