Innovation in Woodworking Technologies: Industry 4.0

Abstract

Technological progress globally, combined with the effects of rapid population growth, has made it necessary to drive down competitive costs. For this reason, the efficient use of inputs such as energy, time, labour and raw materials in production has become important. All these processes have been triggering factors for industrial revolutions. The new process that global industry has brought to the agenda and focused on since 2014 is presented as "Industry 4.0". This new concept undoubtedly concerns many industrial sectors, particularly the automotive industry. The woodworking machinery industry is conducting innovative work at different scales in this direction. All machine systems in the production facility actually function as data generation centres, and this data is pooled together. As a result, the collected data is used to replan machine routing and setup times. Additionally, it is clearly evident that it creates a meaningful increase in production efficiency. Within the scope of this scientific study, how profitability can be increased through the use of data collected in wood production facilities has been examined. The primary objective of all enterprises is to make profit in order to sustain their operations. Consequently, in today's conditions where competition is high and profit margins are low, the focus is on efficiency. One of the most important factors in achieving this is the Industry 4.0 concept.

1- Introduction and General Information

In recent years, the forest products industry, which has shown rapid technological development, has made significant progress not only in machinery but also in software. The diversification of living spaces and changes in furniture perception have brought innovative approaches to the design field. Changes in consumer demand towards individual needs and comfort have made it necessary for producers to develop innovative solutions. Today, furniture has moved beyond being merely a functional object and has become a comfort, aesthetic and functional prestige element. As a result, the era when enterprises simply manufactured and sold cabinets, tables, chairs and similar items has ended. Furniture has become objects that reflect the consumer's life philosophy, express their inner world and create spaces where they feel comfortable. The production of such furniture has increased enterprise inputs, but due to intense competition, revenues have not increased proportionally. For enterprise revenues to increase, non-value-adding activities on the product must be reduced, thereby increasing enterprise efficiency, closing this gap and reaching the desired profitability level. At this stage, by collecting past and current data from the production facility, conducting analyses and taking necessary action based on the results, the desired profitability can be achieved. New production models must be developed that will minimise, if not eliminate, time losses. All of this and good planning, along with monitoring and reporting of distribution, has become standardisable in today's environment. Until now, industrial facilities have been managed with data and observations that planning department personnel could access.

Encountering the Industry 4.0 concept in the 21st century, our industry will clearly see where it experiences losses to achieve the desired profitability level and what solutions might be. Basing future forecasts on more concrete data will also minimise the risk of error.

The industrial revolution that began with the use of the first steam engine in industry at the beginning of the 18th century, driven by rapid world population growth, has directed new pursuits in meeting human needs. The logic of mass production made it necessary to develop more efficient and faster business models. Based on this philosophy, with the use of electrical energy, the introduction of the first assembly lines marked the beginning of the second industrial revolution. The proliferation of mass production, increasing competition, diversifying consumer demands and declining profit margins necessitated the development of factory models operating much more efficiently. The first requirement for increasing efficiency was the ability to use production inputs optimally. The work done at that time, converting analogue systems to digital, was considered the beginning of the third industrial revolution. The rapid entry of the digital world into our lives, developments in information systems continuing to today, and the fact that our world is woven with a cyber network have affected our lives in all areas. In the globalising new world order, increased trade between countries and variable market demands also complicate the control of complex production processes. For enterprises to be sustainable in this competition, they must adopt an innovative approach and adapt to the requirements of the age. The integrated structure whereby information and robotic technologies communicate through cyber networks, objects communicate with each other, and all this data can be processed and collected in a large area (big data) and used in its current form whenever needed forms the foundation of Industry 4.0. The phases of the industrial revolutions briefly described above according to time are presented graphically in Figure 1.

Figure 1. Historical development of industry (Tunçel and Candan, 2017)

The fact that all information can be processed and reported instantly and currently will contribute to speeding up management decision-making processes and making them work more efficiently. Through this study, what the Industry 4.0 concept is and what differences it will create in our enterprises have been addressed. While technological development in the wood industry continues rapidly, at the management level, how Industry 4.0 will bring a vision to our sector has been examined.

1. Technological Development & Industry 4.0

The Industry 4.0 concept first emerged as a project presented by the German government at the Hanover Messe fair in 2011. In 2014, at the National IT Summit held in Hamburg, Germany, and at the "World Economic Forum" in Davos, German Chancellor Angela Merkel emphasised the importance of the fourth industrial revolution. In this regard, the Simatic Germany Facilities within Siemens is referred to as an "Industry 4.0 Factory". With developments in electronic and information systems and the Industry 4.0 approach that follows, information security is one of the most important factors. With this system, large amounts of data will be collected at a centre and distributed from there in current form through internet-based national and international circulation. The collection of big data in cloud systems not only accelerates data circulation but also increases the importance of data security. Therefore, when laying the infrastructure for Industry 4.0, these factors should be taken into account and a strong system infrastructure should be established. Parallel to industrial development, societal development also influences people's behaviour. Changes in socio-economic status and living conditions have created differences in consumer behaviour and needs. This development has led to certain changes in needs prioritisation as well as serious differences in people's spending categories. Under the influence of this developing process, societies have embraced Industry 4.0, followed by the information society, and the rapid development observed in information technologies was first defined by Japan as "Society 5.0", or a super-intelligent society (Realizing Society 5.0, 2017).

2. Society's Perception of Industry 4.0

As a society, having an industry that is receptive to technological development and adapts quickly will enable us to make rapid progress in this development and change. Countries with a say in technology and industry globally are in serious competition through Research and Development work on Industry 4.0. To conduct simultaneous work with world countries on Industry 4.0 and to be able to say we are also in this race, this topic must become state policy and be carried out together with universities, industry and research institutes. In our country, as in many industrial sectors, automation systems are used in the forest products industry and a certain infrastructure and knowledge base has been established in this area. Particularly in managerial issues such as resource management, planning, logistics and quality systems, digitalisation is progressing rapidly. It is known that alongside imported software in these areas, our domestic software is also quite successful. The fact that our enterprises are establishing Research and Development centres clearly shows the effort we are making to advance rapidly in this direction. In the 21st century, along with technological development, there are also very serious changes in business models. To exemplify a few of these different business models that have entered our lives without our awareness, a company providing urban transportation services, which has been frequently mentioned in the press recently, has no vehicles of its own despite having the world's most developed transportation network. The company's communication is conducted entirely through digital channels. The world's largest social networks do not have any content produced by themselves. Similarly, the world's largest e-commerce site has no factories, transport vehicles or warehouses. Consequently, the economic risks of production and logistics have been minimised along with all their disadvantages.

Figure 2. Society's digitalisation process

All processes and sub-parameters from societies' industrialisation to digitalisation are presented in Figure 2. As will be clearly seen from this, the process consists of four main phases. The rapid mechanisation process in the 1980s had evolved into digitalisation by the 2000s. The beginning of the process of objects communicating with each other constituted the Industry 4.0 concept. The integration of this situation with people's social lives will result in the Society 5.0 model.

3. Intelligent Systems in Woodworking Technologies

Proper synchronisation of inputs and constraints in production enterprises will increase enterprise efficiency. For proper enterprise management, data from the field must be collected accurately and on time. This situation will be possible with the machines becoming intelligent. Although current woodworking machines are computer-controlled, they do not have the abilities to communicate with each other, make decisions, or manage the production process. For this purpose, all machines in the enterprise can be made to communicate through sensors and electronically based various elements. As a result, the data produced is collected as raw data in cloud-like systems. Algorithms to manage the relevant production process must be created beforehand. Over time, through machine learning, the system will reach an intelligent point and will be able to manage subsequent decision-making processes itself. The final system that emerges is referred to as intelligent factories (dark factories/digital factories).

Figure 3. General framework of Industry 4.0 (Stock and Seliger, 2016)

To manage all processes from the supply stage to the end consumer, a cyber-physical system infrastructure must be established. This is essentially all objects having an IP address, communicating and transforming into intelligent algorithms capable of decision-making through these defined addresses. Figure 3 expresses the general perspective of Industry 4.0 in a way that will be integrated with an intelligent society. Various elements exist under this large umbrella. These include: production facilities, suppliers, machine systems, energy, cloud systems, logistics and customers. This will enable all enterprises involved in production to use their raw materials optimally and will also eliminate warehouse costs arising from no stockpiling. Consequently, all non-value-adding expenses on the product will be removed, sales costs will decrease and scarce resources will be used more efficiently. Associate Professor Zeki Candan Istanbul University Faculty of Forestry Department of Forest Industry Engineering     Dr. Engineer Sabit Tunçel Board Member Chamber of Forest Engineers  

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