Do you know what a digital thread is? It’s the data flow between multiple applications that defines a product throughout its life. From initial design and development through manufacturing and maintenance and, ultimately, retirement, the digital thread keeps everyone on the same page.
If you’re not utilising a digital thread strategy in your manufacturing organisation, you’re missing out on several benefits. In this article, we’ll tell you about four of them. Let’s get started.
1 – Faster time-to-market
So often in business, victory goes to the first mover. If you can accelerate your design and initial development and get new products on the market before your competitors, you’re more likely to succeed.
A digital thread helps you achieve this in three ways:
- It gives all stakeholders up-to-date and accurate product information in an easily accessible way
- Data is now reusable, helping you redesign or make tweaks to existing products faster
- By linking product usage and performance data, you can create data-driven feedback loops. Your digital thread shows your engineers how customers use their products, which presents new opportunities for improvement
2 – Higher quality products and better customer experiences
However, being the fastest product to market won’t guarantee a win over your competitors. Your product has to be of the highest quality too. Implementing a digital thread ensures your product is the best it can be.
So many errors in manufacturing happen because of misunderstandings or poor communication. A digital thread minimises these issues, acting as a single source of truth for product data that everyone can follow. In addition, you can use your digital thread to create digital twins, mirroring your physical products and acting as a guide for your engineers to maximise quality and reliability.
With better quality products comes a better experience for your users. But you can also go one step further. Using your digital thread as a baseline and utilising the data-driven feedback loops, you can easily customise your products to match the needs of specific groups of customers. When you deliver something personal that meets someone’s unique requirements, you’re more likely to win.
3 – Productivity gains
Gains in productivity and efficiency can massively boost your profit margins. Even the smallest gains can make a significant difference, especially at the beginning of the manufacturing process.
Your digital thread is a huge productivity booster. It makes collaboration between functions much more manageable, eliminating the silos that can slow your processes down. Each function can easily access the information they need to make decisions, provide feedback and deliver the goods on time.
A digital thread can also reduce costly and time-consuming manual errors. Because everything is connected on the digital thread, if you need to change something, you only need to enter it once rather than multiple times. It minimises the opportunities to make mistakes and raises consistency throughout the product lifecycle.
4 – Simpler regulatory compliance
It seems like every year there are new rules and regulations you need to comply with. However, rolling out a digital thread can turn compliance into a competitive advantage and totally commit to quality, safety and sustainability.
Your digital thread contains every piece of information on your product throughout its lifecycle. Whether it’s design specs, components, materials, usage data or anything else, it’s easily accessible and simple to navigate. If you change anything, it automatically changes everything else in the thread that is relevant. Therefore, when it’s time to apply for accreditation or your regulators ask you any questions, you have all the data you need at your fingertips.
Discover more, and download your copy of our Digital Thread Guide:
