Altair Inc. a global leader in computational science and artificial intelligence, recently conducted a global survey to promote a better understanding of digital twin technology and its adoption.
The 2022 Digital Twin Global Survey gathered insights from 2,007 professionals: both upper-management and user-level employees with diverse engineering fields in different organizations of varying sizes across industrialized countries in Europe, Asia Pacific (APAC), and the USA. From the survey, 69% of respondents said their organization currently leveraged digital twin technology, 23% said their organization did not, and 8% were not sure.
50% of the respondents said that their companies utilised digital twin technology to create smart digital objects that self-diagnose and recommend corrective or preventive actions on a physical asset. As a result of the adoption, respondents from the consumer electronics, AEC, and industrial equipment sectors mostly said their organizations had lowered maintenance and warranty costs by using digital twin technology.
“Of the organisations that do not currently employ digital twin technology, 76% of respondents believed their leaders would be more likely to invest in digital twin technology if its benefits were clearer,” shared Altair Managing Director ASEAN and ANZ, Srirangam Srirangarajan. “Thus, Altair, as a global tech leader, is committed to ensuring that businesses are properly educated on digital twin technology, to help them make better and more informed purchasing decisions. Alignment between leadership and user-level employees, in an organization, is crucial. Without it, companies may struggle to maximize their investments.”
Digital twin technology is the process of using data streams to create a digital representation of a real-world asset to improve collaboration, information access, and decision-making. The technology is now becoming increasingly popular due to its ability to monitor an asset’s performance and identify potential problems, helping organizations make informed decisions for maintenance and product lifecycle.
“Despite the rapid rate of adoption of digital twin technology among enterprises, it is obvious that there is a lack of clarity surrounding the technology and its justification. This is seen between an organization’s senior management and working level personnel, as well as between different sizes of organizations,” highlighted Srirangam.
Anticipating a global recession in 2023, it is crucial for companies to adopt cost-efficient and sustainable technology solutions. Among the principal benefits of the digital twin, technology is forecasting analysis and resource conservation. The technology enables businesses to analyze and predict the future behaviors and risks of a product, in which many accidents can be prevented. Adding to its advantage of promoting cost-efficiency, digital twin technology also enables companies to determine whether resources are used efficiently and effectively and if adjustments are needed for optimal utilization.
According to respondents who were employed in organizations utilising digital twin technology, the most common benefits from the technology are real-time monitoring and control (38%), efficiency and safety (37%), and cost savings (33%). When asked how digital twin technology had impacted their costs, 62% of respondents disclosed that digital twin technology had reduced financial costs.
Furthermore, 85% of respondents shared that their organization either did or was planning to use digital twin technology to achieve its sustainability goals. As a matter of fact, the survey found that 73% of respondents believed digital twin technology helped their organization create more sustainable products or processes, and said that digital twin technology made their products and processes less wasteful or more energy efficiently.
One of the best examples of successful digital twin technology adoption would be in neighboring Singapore, which has modeled the entire state in 3D, reportedly making it the world’s largest digital twin. This model is able to collect a multitude of information in real-time using tools like sensors and drones, with the goal of improving performance in areas like energy consumption and environmental concerns and making the city more intelligent.
“Altair thinks that digital twin technology will have a significant impact on design and manufacturing in the future and that early adopters in particular will profit by providing superior items to the market before rivals. We are eager to modernize the application of digital twin technology across a variety of sectors in order to improve business processes, create better products, and meet organizational sustainability goals and targets,” concluded Srirangam.
Respondents to Altair’s 2022 Digital Twin Global Survey were from a cross-section of industries such as aerospace, architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC), automotive, banking, financial services, and insurance (BFSI), consumer electronics, energy, oil, and gas, healthcare, heavy equipment, industrial equipment, manufacturing, and information technology (IT).
