Huawei, Haier, and China Mobile have unveiled some techniques they’ve deployed in smart factories to boost manufacturing production. The key to the new techniques is 5G technology which has only been available commercially for a couple of years. The new innovations developed by the Chinese firms are threefold and were developed at their newly established joint-innovation base.
The first innovation involves the use of machine vision to perform quality checks. Huawei said the checks are performed ‘rapidly’ with more than 99% accuracy. The new technique increases accuracy by 10% and delivers much fewer false positive and false negative results. This will help companies get products out to market more efficiently which could help to reduce costs.
The second technique that the partners developed is in AI-surveillance. While it sounds a little bit dystopian, it’s actually quite mundane but helps to boost safety. The new system is able to create alarms in real time when it detects an anomaly on the factory floor. Additionally, it can identify non-authorised individuals and workers who aren’t in areas they should be and can process safety violations.
Finally, 5G is being used to operate HD cameras, 5G gateways, and smart industrial terminals that work together with the aid of artificial intelligence. According to Huawei, this technique helps to coordinate a large number of people, machines, and materials that are involved with complex production lines. Any issues that arise should be noticed early on so normal operations can resume more quickly.
One of the partners, Haier, has deployed the technologies to seven of its smart factories in China and plans to expand them to 20 more factories by the end of next year. Huawei will assist Haier in deploying 5G solutions to 100 manufacturing facilities within five years and together, the three partners will offer their solutions to other big manufacturers in China and abroad.