Watch: ‘Covid is accelerating digital supply chain and production’ | Your questions answered with EY’s Bart Huthwaite

The Covid-19 crisis has brought to the fore efforts by automotive manufacturers to improve visibility across operations and suppliers, increase connectivity and digitally simulate processes across the value chain. Bart Huthwaite, EY’s principal for automotive and transportation, outlines the key technologies that OEMs are adapting to transform processes across the supply chain, including robot process automation and digtal twins.

He also assesses changes in automotive sourcing and production patterns that could result both from the crisis as well as wider trade disputes, including potential shifts towards regional supply chains, as well as impacts on wider networks of warehouses and distribution centres across the supply chain.

This session covers in-depth the following quetions, all from our Livestream audience: 

• Are you seeing anything new and innovative in the IIoT space for manufacturing plants? 
• What areas of the supply chain would you identify as being most ripe for automation? 
• Digital twinning – how significant a role do you see it playing in the supply chain now and in future? 
• How is interface management going to evolve in the future? Do you see automation in this area in the close future?
• Do the new digital tools and capabilities such as SMART Factory reduce the economies of scale in assembly and some mfg processes? 
• Are OEMs investing enough in cyber security and does that suggest that OEMs needs to invest more in greater ‘smart’ systems? 
• Does creating a more regionally oriented SC create a more resilient model even if some economies of scale are sacrificed? 
• If we were to look at such shifts for manufacturing, who might be winners and losers? 
• Trade wars and tensions remain significant. What role do you see these having on the wider automotive supply chain? 
• What role can digital tools play in mitigating trade barriers and uncertainty? 
• There is a lot of debate over whether the automotive industry will see fundamental changes to its lean or JIT production models. Do you see any evidence that it should change? 
• Is the automotive sector making positive moves towards more advanced S&OP and demand planning?