“Of the latest WEF network of ‘beacon factories’, 40 per cent are Chinese.” Federico Torti, head of the World Economic Forum’s Center for Advanced Manufacturing and Supply Chain, told the Interface think tank in a recent interview. Over the past six years, he has led a team of expert judges who have visited manufacturing plants around the world and selected representatives who have adopted the most advanced technologies.

PXIe-5160 “In the last 12 to 15 months, we have seen an increase in applications from Chinese factories for technologies that directly or indirectly contribute to sustainability, which means that Chinese factories are not only investing in efficiency and productivity, but also explicitly investing in sustainability.” Torti points out.

“Lighthouse Factory” is defined as a model factory for the wide application of Industry 4.0 technology. In December 2023, the World Economic Forum announced the latest list of “lighthouse factories”, the new 21 “lighthouse factories” in 2023, of which 12 are in China, a total of 153 “lighthouse factories” in the world, and 62 factories in China.

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As of December 2023, there are 153 “lighthouse factories” in the world. Image: White paper “Global Network of ‘Lighthouse Factories’ : Speed and Scale of AI Applications”

The World Economic Forum pointed out that every industrial revolution has a decisive breakthrough, the past is the steam engine, power-driven mass production, automation brought by computers, and now it is the machine intelligence brought by big data that defines the fourth industrial revolution. AI technology is revolutionizing manufacturing.

Over the past five years, the Lighthouse Factory network has included 700 Fourth Industrial Revolution application cases, 200 of which employ AI technology.

PXIe-5160 The white paper states that each new “beacon factory” is driving the adoption of generative AI, as generative AI will contribute $2.6-4.4 trillion to the world economy annually, of which a quarter can come from manufacturing and supply chain production improvements.

For example, Agilent, an instrument company, manages supply chain risk by analyzing supplier information to predict material availability. Ingrasys uses order history data and market data to forecast order volumes; Unilever automatically replenishes inventory based on previous day’s sales, inventory targets, capacity limits, etc. Hengtong Alpha (Suzhou, China) uses advanced analytical techniques to optimize preforming and drawing process parameters.

For the “lighthouse factory”, it also needs to retrain workers to cooperate with the 4.0 revolution of the factory. Longi Green Energy, a Chinese solar energy company, was awarded the “Lighthouse Factory” in 2023. The white paper cites Longi Green Energy as an example, saying that it has implemented an internal evaluation training certification system and customized learning and development plans for nearly 1,000 employees.