This means manufacturers must now deal with all different types of joints and therefore joining technology.”
This is an upheaval for the space, one that raises questions for automotive manufacturers in the next couple of decades. “It is a big issue, not only for a capital-intensive floor full of spot welders that could become obsolete, but also in selecting what technologies to use for joining,” adds Mears. “We are not sure the long-term performance of some in terms of corrosion and fatigue, so what is a carmaker to do to have reliable vehicles that last 20 years and beyond?”
Trend 3: The IoT will increasingly connect the unconnectable.
Each year, IoT growth is projected and invested parties attempt to separate the hype from the reality. In 2020, the Eclipse Foundation released an IoT Commercial Adoption Survey that suggested about 40% of organizations were already deploying IoT solutions and 22% planned to deploy within two years. IoT investments were set to grow, with 40% of participating organizations saying they had plans to bump their IoT spending in the next fiscal year. However, the year took a turn no one could have anticipated. The expectation now is that companies will still invest in IoT as long as it’s a need and not just a want.
Shiyu Zhou, a professor in the Dept. of Industrial and Systems Engineering at the University of Wisconsin, Madison, says in 2021, we will see more and more engineering applications of IoT technology in practice, which means more devices will be online. “Another trend in IoT will be the edge computing,” Zhou says.