The SAP Industry 4.0 Center in Newtown Square is using artificial intelligence to increase manufacturing efficiency around the world, writes Joseph N. DiStefano for The Philadelphia Inquirer.

The center helps clients use software to automate production and integrate it into supply, accounting, marketing and sales.

An example of the AI software in use came after Hurricane Helene damaged western North Carolina. There was a sudden massive need for intravenous saline bags for all the injured patients flooding medical facilities.

Atrium Health hospital group contacted Jim Polk, a tech executive at Exela Pharmaceutical Sciences to fill the order.

“That could take six months,” Polk thought.

But Exela had upgraded its manufacturing technology with new self-improving SAP AI software after Polk visited the Newtown Square center in late summer. 

The software connected factory production data to materials-sourcing, labor-supply, government-compliance, market demand, shipping, pricing, and other functions. The AI automatically pinpointed and fixed problems.

Exela was producing IV bags ready to ship in less than three weeks.

“It’s the future of manufacturing — purely digital, completely paperless,” and heavily automated, said Don Overton, Excela’s finance chief.  

Read more details about how the Center is designed and how it is helping manufacturers in The Philadelphia Inquirer.