Engineering.com, 9 March 2016 -  Yamazaki Mazak has announced the construction of a new production facility combining production automation and Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) technology.

The new facility, which is part of Mazak’s iSMART Factory concept, will cover over 500,000 sq ft of floor space designated for manufacturing large machine tools.

The idea behind the iSMART concept is to build factories that use advanced manufacturing cells and systems together with full digital integration to achieve free-flow data sharing for process control and operation monitoring.

According to the company, this new factory will boost productivity by more than 50 percent.

Interestingly, although it is being constructed in Inabe City, Mie Prefecture, Japan, the company stated that the new factory is following in the footsteps of Mazak’s Kentucky plant in realizing the iSMART Factory concept.Smart Factory Growth

The announcement of this new factory fits with a recent report that predicts the market value of smart factories to reach USD$74.8 billion by 2022. The key factors the report identifies as driving market growth include the adoption of IIoT technologies and advancements in machine-to-machine communication. Both are central aspects of Mazak’s iSMART Factory concept.

The report also predicts that the Asia-Pacific region will hold the largest share and dominate the smart factory market between 2016 and 2022. This is partly due to growth in the manufacturing sectors of China and India and also to the geographical expansion of automotive manufacturers in the region.

Cost is one of the primary restraining factors cited by the report, particularly the expenses involved in upgrading legacy systems. Seen in that light, Mazak’s construction of an entirely new smart factory makes perfect sense.

Completion of the USD$176 million (¥20 billion) plant is scheduled for 2019.

For more information, visit the Mazak website.