This Intelligent Manufacturing Innovation Center is a 30,000 square foot, four-hour choregraphed experience, built around an intelligent, fully connected, end-to-end operational production line, demonstrating the latest (and future) technologies representing key categories of manufacturing use cases. It serves as a proof point for collaboration and integration across all areas of an intelligent operation, immersing guests into the Industry 4.0 advancements that solve the most pressing business problems.

Guest experiences include hands-on explorations of new technologies, leading-edge demonstrations and scenario planning, controlled disruptions, and extensive linear and interactive content.

The Center is also a home to a diverse ecosystem of partners and solution providers who collaborate to deliver innovative and sustainable solutions to the archetypal industry problems inherent in the shift to the autonomous and connected future of Industry 4.0. This ecosystem, and the Center’s audience, combines manufacturing leaders, solution partners, sponsors, start-ups, STEM educators, researchers, and students into one shared-knowledge community.

↓ ↓ ↓ Long Version Case Study ↓ ↓ ↓

1: Prologue and Disruption

2: Historical Challenges and Innovations (aka The Past)

3: Intelligent Solutions (aka The Future, Today)

4: Applied Intelligence

5: Disruption in Action

30,000 SQUARE FEET

6 DEDICATED STORYTELLING SPACES

4 DISTINCT AUDIO SPACES

30 INDEPENDENT MULTIMODAL DIGITAL CANVASES

2 MULTIUSER INTERACTIVE TABLES

20 MINUTES OF LINEAR VIDEO

UNCOUNTABLE HOURS OF INTERACTIVE CONTENT

9 REAL-TIME DIGITAL TWINS

200+ REAL-TIME LIVE DATA VISUALIZATIONS

1: Prologue and Disruption

Upon arrival guests are introduced to the Intelligent Manufacturing vision, inviting them into the mindset of disruption while also validating their skepticism around future-facing tech.

To illustrate the impact of this disruption in action, they are introduced to the depth of real-time data and insight generated at the Center. The quantifiable results of smart, disruptive technologies to be unpacked and expanded on in the experiences to come.

At the interactive table, guests are encouraged to disrupt the responsive surface and explore the intelligent manufacturing process through a gamified, non-liner narrative. This micro-experience sets the participatory expectations for the Innovation Center, and helps guide guests into a mindset for exploring, uncovering, questioning, and discovering—encouraging interest and rewarding curiosity.

2: Historical Challenges and Innovations (aka The Past)

This space combines choreographed video, audio, and lighting, with self-directed interactions, highlighting the historical challenges and innovations of the technological revolutions, and the related societal shifts of the previous 300 years.

These archetypes from Industry 1.0, 2.0, and 3.0 are then reframed against the current 4.0 evolution with customized content that connects this storytelling to use cases specific to the guest’s business, their specific challenges, and their place in this transformation.

A four-screen array presenting the evergreen "Evolution of Manufaturing" story, describing the technological shifts of the past and how they influenced society; and guest-specific "Industry 4.0 Challenges and Opportunities", which frame their challenges, and the possible solutions offered by Industry 4.0.

Guests are invited to explore the historic innovations of the 3D-printed (at completely unrelated scales) artifact wall with their mobile device, to learn about the history and impact of the innovations to industry and society, and wonder at the “antique” injection-molder—the intelligent version of which they will see in action on the factory floor.

The retractable wall displays projected content throughout the guests’ time in this space, complementing the primary stories, and building anticipation for the reveal of the next storytelling space.

3: Intelligent Solutions (aka The Future, Today)

The stories in this space are focused on the real-world advantages of Intelligent Manufacturing technologies—from current standards, to cutting-edge disruptors, and future-facing technologies just beginning to emerge—helping guests make actionable connections between problems and solutions.

Part presentation, part self-directed exploration, digital and physical, with choreographed light and sound, the experiences in this space are designed to inspire with novel technologies that seem futuristic, but are realistic, practical, and attainable now.

At the central demonstration table, guests can explore deep interactive content or experience various physical products, all curated for relevance to the their business.

For the digital library, guests select a physical object representing a specific technology solution category, and place it on the interactive table to activate the relevant solutions, all organized across a navigable spectrum of macro-technology forces and use cases, each with detailed case studies (all of which can be managed remotely by the Center's partners).

4: Applied Intelligence

The fully-operational command center provides a holistic systems view of the factory operations and network, demonstrationg how “the brain” responds, adapts, and connects in real- time. The experience includes a virtual tour of the factory floor, an extensive real-time data landscape, a production line overview with real-time digital twins for all production cells, and ecosystem partner software demos.

Live data visualizations communicate the overall health and performance of the factory by surfacing data including supply chain, productivity of people and assets, operational quality and performance, movement of data along the production line, building operations, sustainability, site safety, financials, and cyber security.

The experience in this space is controlled by a docent-operated tablet, accompanied by ecosystem SMEs for live scenario planning, workstation roleplay, and factory floor simulations specific to the guests’ business challenges.

Production Line Virtual Tour

Factory and Network Operations Performance

Production Line Performance and Digital Twins

5: Disruption in Action

The choreographed experience ends on the factory floor itself where guests can witness the disruption in action. On the 50-foot real-time digital ribbon they can track the movement and assembly of the product, follow the digital thread of data through the entire process, get detailed performance and operation metrics of the nine production cells, and monitor the overall health, status, and performance of the entire line.

Or just watch the robots and cobots work.

Current Orders, Real-Time Status

Production Cells, Real-Time Status

Production Line, Real-Time Status

Designed at Gensler DXD, New York
Architecture: Gensler

Digital Experience Design (DXD) Director: Weston Bingham
Designers: Weston Bingham, Angela Chen, Jen D’Agostino, Brady Ginn, Priscilla Gomez, Danni Huang, Jeian Jeong, Melissa Kelly, May Kim, Ping Lim, Danny Rubyono (Duro Compagnie), Elizabeth Steinberg (Martian and Sons), Peter Young
Interactive UX/UI: Weston Bingham, May Kim, Ping Lim

Experience Strategy: Amy Ridley Bansak, Sarah Goodin, Nathan Welch
Content Strategy: Amy Ridley Bansak, Sarah Goodin, Nathan Welch
Writers: Kyle Barron-Cohen, Eva Green (Third Person)
Historical Researcher: Siyou Tan

Hardware Technologist: Jay Ho
Software Technologist: Blair Neal, Elburz Sarkhobi
Producers: Robert Cohen, David O'Brien, Roman Shishalov, Tristan Valencia

Custom Interactive Table Fabricators: Ideum
Lighting Design: Michael Stiller (upLight Studio)

Photography and Videos: Gensler