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Michael Makuza, Business Reporter
BUSINESSES should embrace digital technology modelling to improve product quality, boost efficiency and enhance competitiveness as critical steps to sustainability and remaining profitable, an industry expert has said.
Speaking during an end of year marketers’ dinner organised by the Marketers Association of Zimbabwe (MAZ) in Bulawayo last Friday, Zimbabwe International Trade Fair (ZITF) Company chief executive officer, Dr Nicholas Ndebele, said embracing digital technology was no longer optional.
His noted that the elements of “Industry 4.0”, a modern phase of industrialisation that focuses heavily on interconnectivity, automation, machine learning, and real-time data, should be part of business strategy.
“It’s important for businesses across the board to be able to use and apply these elements in order to improve product quality, boost efficiency, stay competitive, enhance sustainability, and remain profitable,” said Dr Ndebele.
“We’re living in the middle of possibly the most complex industry era of all time: Industry 4.0, also known as the Fourth Industrial Revolution has not only changed the way we work but how we interact with each other, in our personal and professional spaces.”
He said the world has evolved over the years and that at each successive stage, businesses have equally evolved with digital technology modelling now the buzz word.
Hence Industry 4.0 encompasses industrial Internet of things, smart manufacturing that blends physical production and operations with smart digital technology, among others, to create a more holistic and better-connected ecosystem for companies.
“It’s important for people to teach themselves, which is why it’s important for the MAZ platform to constantly give opportunities for engagement, for networking and for reminding companies that it’s in their best interest to invest in modern technology and adopt and utilise them,” said Dr Ndebele.
Bongani Ndlovu
Online Reporter