The new scenarios of Industry 4.0

After 20 years of relocation to Asia, the German giant Adidas has decided to return to production in Germany: in the new plant in Bavaria will be the robotic technology to drive the assembly line, increasing production performance as never before.
"Speedfactory will combine the design and development of sportswear with an automated production process, decentralized and flexible," said Herbert Hainer, CEO of Adidas Group.

The transition from Asian manual production to German robotic production will take place by 2016 and will go into full swing in 2017: but Gerd Manz, deputy head of the group's Technological Innovation division, assures the adoption of a mixed model, decrying the possibility that robotics will take over.
Adidas is one of the protagonists of the so-called Industry 4.0, the fourth industrial revolution defined in this way for the first time at the Hannover Fair in 2011. This phenomenon is changing the methods of production of goods and services and will probably also affect the working relationships.

What are the elements that characterize Industry 4.0? The new technologies have a significant impact on four macro-areas:

• the collection and use of data, involving the areas big data, open data, Internet of Things;
• the analysis phase involving aspects ofanalytics;
• the interaction between man and machine thanks totouch interface systems and augmented reality;
• the transition from digital to "real" which includes additive manufacturing (3D printing), robotics, machine-to-machine interactions.

In November 2015, the Italian Ministry for Economic Development also presented its strategy on the subject with the document "Industry 4.0, the Italian way for manufacturing competitiveness", outlining some ways of intervention including: boosting industrial investments with particular attention to those in research and development, knowledge and innovation; encouraging the dimensional growth of companies; supporting new innovative entrepreneurship; guaranteeing network security and privacy protection; ensuring adequate network infrastructures; spreading skills for Industry 4.0; channelling financial resources.

Some of the technologies that are dragging industry towards the new revolution, such as IoT, augmented reality and 3D printing, also have an impact on a more everyday and domestic dimension and intercept the demand and interest of private users.

This is the case of the two crowdfunding campaigns of Lumi Industries successfully closed. In the wake of the interest found, the startup was born, present in the portfolio of Club Italia Investimenti 2, with the mission of making the advantages of 3D printing available to everyone in a user-friendly way. Lumi Industries offers products that are simple to use, easily transportable and a range of software, accessories and video tutorials that facilitate the printing activity. It is based on resin technology, called stereolithography, in DLP version (using a Digital Light Processing) and with top down projection.
To invest in Lumi Industries and in other 63 startups you can make a public offering on the equity crowdfunding platform Mamacrowd.