To take advantage of digitization, industrial manufacturers need new operating models, aggressive hiring, smart partnerships, and targeted investments.
Industrial manufacturers inhabit a world littered with uneasiness. Global demand for manufactured products is growing at a snail’s pace. Output is expected to increase just 3.1 percent in 2016 and 3.4 percent in 2017, according to the International Monetary Fund. Growth is dampened by Brexit concerns and political uncertainties. Foreign trade is at historically low levels, and, although oil prices have recovered a bit recently, they are not rising enough to undo the collapse in drilling and concomitant retraction in the rest of the energy supply chain.
More problems could be in the offing. New nationalist governments around the world, including the United States, are threatening to further undermine the free flow of goods, creating more uncertainty and constraints upon manufacturing growth. The ripple effects of any attempts to reset trade agreements would be felt in the industrial manufacturing sector; manufacturers with plants in Mexico and China could see their business models decline quickly under the weight of increased import duties and tariffs. Many will take a wait-and-see approach, delaying capital expenditure investments until more clarity on actual policies emerges.
Adafruit publishes a wide range of writing and video content, including interviews and reporting on the maker market and the wider technology world. Our standards page is intended as a guide to best practices that Adafruit uses, as well as an outline of the ethical standards Adafruit aspires to. While Adafruit is not an independent journalistic institution, Adafruit strives to be a fair, informative, and positive voice within the community – check it out here: adafruit.com/editorialstandards
Stop breadboarding and soldering – start making immediately! Adafruit’s Circuit Playground is jam-packed with LEDs, sensors, buttons, alligator clip pads and more. Build projects with Circuit Playground in a few minutes with the drag-and-drop MakeCode programming site, learn computer science using the CS Discoveries class on code.org, jump into CircuitPython to learn Python and hardware together, TinyGO, or even use the Arduino IDE. Circuit Playground Express is the newest and best Circuit Playground board, with support for CircuitPython, MakeCode, and Arduino. It has a powerful processor, 10 NeoPixels, mini speaker, InfraRed receive and transmit, two buttons, a switch, 14 alligator clip pads, and lots of sensors: capacitive touch, IR proximity, temperature, light, motion and sound. A whole wide world of electronics and coding is waiting for you, and it fits in the palm of your hand.
Have an amazing project to share? The Electronics Show and Tell is every Wednesday at 7pm ET! To join, head over to YouTube and check out the show’s live chat – we’ll post the link there.
