China`s Midea Group`s Intelligent Manufacturing Strategy for Creating a New Human-Machine Ecosystem
| Case Code: OPER158 Case Length: 17 Pages Period: 2021-2022 Pub Date: 2022 Teaching Note: Available |
Price: Rs.400 Organization : Midea Group Co. Ltd Industry :Home Appliances & Consumer Products Countries : China Themes: Operations Strategy, Digital Transformation, Lean Manufacturing,Technology Strategy |
Abstract Case Intro 1 Case Intro 2 Excerpts
Excerpts
Midea’s Focus on Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT)
Throughout its history, Midea strove to keep itself abreast of the latest technologies and innovations that were sweeping through the global consumer electronics industry. In the early 1990s, the company became the first Township Enterprise to hire staff with doctoral degrees..
Acquisition of Kuka
In January 2017, Midea acquired KUKA to make it part of its smart manufacturing industry chain. With the technological assistance of KUKA, Midea planned to build a robot park in Shunde, where it had production facilities. It would have a capacity of 75,000 robots assisting in the manufacturing (with a total capacity of 100,000 robot units including existing capacities) and automatic guided vehicles, by 2024. In addition to 6-axis-robots , the robot park was expected to be used to produce, develop, and distribute new robots, specifically for the Chinese market...
Building With Visual Components
In 2018, Midea started a project to launch a flexible assembly line to produce high-end washing machines. The new assembly line was built in the Wuxi factory of Midea’s Laundry Appliances Division in Wuxi, China. Apart from producing top class washing machines, Midea expected the new assembly line to be adept at accommodating orders for customized washing machines..
Implementation of Industry 4.0 (4IR) Technologies
Midea implemented 4IR technologies in its plants to transform the automated factories into an end-to-end connected value chain. In September 2020, a Midea factory located in Nansha, Guangzhou, China, was recognized for its 4IR achievements. Its household air conditioning factory in Nansha was selected by the World Economic Forum (WEF) to join the Global Lighthouse Network , an honor granted to only 54 companies internationally in various industry sectors...
The Road Ahead
In June 2020, UL LLC. (UL) , a leading global safety science company, announced that Midea was the first company in China to be recognized for achieving UL’s IoT Security Rating. These silver level ratings, as assessed by UL, established that four of Midea’s air conditioning and dehumidifier product lines used industry’s best practices for IoT cyber security..
Exhibits
Exhibit I: About Industrial Internet of things (IIoT) in China, as of 2020
Exhibit II: Midea Timeline
Exhibit III: Midea’s Key Brands and Products
Exhibit IV: Midea’s Primary Home Appliance Products (By Retail Sales) in 2020
Exhibit V: Global Market Share of HVAC industry in 2020
Exhibit VI: Key Financial data of Midea Group (Amount in RMB Million)
Exhibit VII: Analytics Zoo Framework
Exhibit VIII: Midea’s AI-based Industrial Vision Inspection Cloud Platform
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