Accelerating Change Drives Supply Chains – Interview with George Prest

While at the 2016 MHI Annual Conference, Ben Ames of DC Velocity interviewed CEO George Prest of MHI as part of the Supply Chain Thought Leaders Video Series, presented by DC Velocity and MHI.

The theme of the conference was Accelerating Change, and topics that came up over and over again were automation and artificial intelligence (AI). There are mind blowing things that are happening in these two fields and material handling and supply chain are benefiting. While these technologies continue to have long range development needs and applications, many of the technologies are existing and aiding on the shop floor right now.

Because of the exponential rate of development for technology and the accelerated change we see in the industry, companies’ biggest challenges right now are how to absorb all the information and options being thrown at them. Company leaders have to find the best technology for their part of the industry and put it to best application within their process. In order to do that, they need to listen to their customers and find the pain points. Customers want what they always want: Faster, Better, Cheaper; automation and AI development is driven and shaped by those demands.

Some are afraid that automation is going to steal jobs away from hard-working people. What automation does is replace the dangerous, the dirty jobs, making the workplace safer, but also creates new jobs as the machines need to be manufactured, design, restored, maintained – the list goes on. These jobs create a better standard of living. Prest gives the example of stagecoach drivers once being an incredibly popular job, but you don’t really see much of that anymore. They’ve been replace by airline pilots. Pilots could be replaced by something in the future, the cycle always continues. In fact, automation and AI are making it cheaper (as of last year) to manufacture in the US rather than in China.

To see the full interview, visit http://www.dcvelocity.com/dcvtv/news/5231280761001/

.