Page 2 of 14

How Truck Driving Simulators Improve Driver Safety

March 30, 2022 / palmira voelkerding

Good drivers are a necessity when it comes to your trucking business. With how many products are being shipped today in our rapidly growing economy, there is a lot of competition for good-paying jobs.

You can improve your hiring process and get the best drivers on the road by looking for ways to stand out from other trucking businesses. The benefits of a truck simulator can save your company a lot of time while increasing safety and saving you money in the future.

How Truck Simulators Work

The truck simulator owes a lot to its predecessor, flight simulators which have been around for years. If you place a trainee in the cockpit of a plane too soon, this can present all sorts of danger. Similarly, if you place a trainee at the wheel of a truck, the same kinds of dangers exist.

Before hitting the road, drivers need a safe environment to gain the experience they need with a truck’s instruments, visibility, feel, and gears. A truck simulator creates a safe environment to gain that experience. The truck simulator gives the appearance of a cab of a truck; complete with a driver’s seat and controls. Computer screens give the driver a realistic 180-degree view. The software simulates what’s ahead, to the side, and in the side mirrors. Practical scenarios are presented such as driving in traffic, parking, and backing up. Responsive controls can simulate the feel of all types of trucks.

Increased Safety

Increased safety is one of the biggest benefits of using a truck driving simulator. New trainees can log many hours of hands-on experience where they can make their mistakes where it’s safe. Simulator training is used throughout multiple industries including the medical industry where students can learn in a safe environment. Hundreds of hours can be logged by drivers before they get into the cab of one of your trucks.

While being able to make all the common mistakes new drivers make without any real-world consequences, real driving situations are performed using a truck driving simulator. Supervisors can review the data and performance of trainees and document areas where improvement is needed before handing over the keys to your truck. With the driver training services offered in a simulator, mastery is possible without the dangers of the real world.

Cost-Efficient Training

With the rise in fuel prices, the first stages of training can be incredibly expensive. Truck simulators require zero fuel saving you money while new hires can still log their initial training time.

Your trucks already are delt a great amount of wear and tear because of the road. You can increase the lifespan of your trucks by avoiding the harsh driving that comes during training. Once training is completed, you can trust your drivers will have the necessary skills to avoid putting your trucks through unnecessary stress.

Learn More about Truck Simulators

Truck simulators open up doors to a whole new world of truck driver training. As a result, you will get better-trained drivers and major savings on fuel and maintenance costs. Drivers will be able to practice common tasks like gear shifting, starting and stopping, and backing and parking. These tasks will feel realistic when using the advanced software provided with truck simulators.

Road conditions of all sorts can be simulated like icy and wet roads. Drivers can experience what it’s like to drive through crowded urban cities or a poorly paved open road. Your drivers will be ready for any kind of road conditions.

Get all these benefits and many more with truck simulators. Your greatest asset is your driver. Create the most optimized training program for them that they wouldn’t get at other companies. Adding truck simulators to your training program will allow you to build the trust you need in your drivers.

How To Go Shopping With Babies

March 29, 2022 / Full Editorial

There are so many simple tasks that suddenly become daunting once you become a mom. Take shopping: there are so many ways that putting a baby in a grocery cart can go wrong! So here are some simple tips on how to go shopping with babies.

Put The Baby’s Car Seat in the Shopping Cart

This is a very tempting option, but it does come with significant downsides. Studies show that an average of 24,000 babies a year are involved in some kind of mishap as a result of being in a car seat on a shopping cart.

As inviting as this option is, car seats are not built to fit into shopping carts. Because they are such a poor fit, it makes it highly likely that your baby will be involved in some kind of mishap. Mishaps can be as extreme as a fractured skull, a concussion and even death.

If you have to use a shopping cart, check to see if it has a safe dock feature that allows you to safely dock the car seat on the shopping cart.

Wearable Babies!

A safer way to shop with your baby is to wear your baby. Strap your baby onto you using a baby carrier. It’s a great way to bond with your child, and keep them feeling warm and safe. Moreover, it’s not only safe, it’s convenient.

Use a Baby Shopping Hammock

Many people haven’t tried this before, but it’s a great way to shop with your baby and it’s good for your back too!

Baby shopping hammocks have passed the most stringent safety tests and been certified as complying with the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA) standards.

They are designed so that your baby stays inside the hammock throughout your shopping trip, thanks to the seat harness and baby carrier strap.

The hammock is really light, so you can put it in your diaper bag or purse.

Use a Stroller

Using a Silver Cross Wave stroller is a very safe way to shop with your baby if you are going to the store with your partner or a friend. It’s safe, and it’s comfortable for your baby. It’s also a viable solution for you even if you’re shopping alone with your baby.

There are a number of ways that you can shop with a stroller:

Push the stroller as you pull the cart. You shouldn’t do this if you can’t balance your attention between the stroller and the cart.
Remove the infant seat and place it in the cart. As with the car seat, you will have to make sure that there is a safe dock feature so that this is done safely. You can put your groceries around the baby seat. This is best done if you are not buying a lot of things.
Get a Baby Carrier and Use it with the Stroller. Many parents use a stroller to put their goods in, and then carry their babies while shopping.
Put your groceries under the stroller. Another solution is to place your groceries under your stroller and forego the cart altogether.

The Era Of The Smart Home Draws Near

March 24, 2022 / Full Editorial

Artificial intelligence is eating the world, one industry at a time and it’s eating the housing industry. We are on the verge of a new era of the “smart home”. Home automation brings the home alive. In the smart home, a home’s attributes, such as lighting, entertainment systems, climate and appliances can be monitored and/or controlled. This can also extend to home security, with automation of alarm systems and access control. Home devices that are connected to the internet form part of the Internet of Things (IoT). The possibilities of the smart home are many and as more and more homes become automated, we are getting to a tipping point before mass adoption.

Why Does the Smart Home Matter?

Home automation promises to bring all the key features of your home as well as any gadgets under one seamless central smart home hub (or “gateway”). In a smart home, you will be able to control everything in your home with voice commands, saving you time, making your home more convenient, as well as saving on energy use and costs.

How Are Smart Homes Set Up?

This is a massive evolution in the nature of the home and it’s a future that you can literally help build. The technology behind the smart home is designed to be installable by its users. Firms such as ADT believe that the DIY nature of smart homes will make them more attractive to homeowners. The company’s DIY smart home security system is an example of this. It is an intelligent system for the protection of your household goods, from your Creative Cabinets to pot plants, and it is powered by AI and controlled and installed by the consumer.

At present, most DIY systems do take some tech savvy, but engineers are moving toward DIY solutions, but at present, consumers have to settle for “Do It For Me” or DIFM solutions. This entails having a professional install the system for you, and working to reduce the number of apps, hardware devices and switches that are needed to control the system.

Can I Use Different Smart Home Devices Together?

Interoperability is not an inherent feature of the internet. This is also true of IoT devices. However, a new industry standard, Matter, promises to bring missing interoperability to the smart home industry.

Matter is the product of the Connectivity Standards Alliance (CSA), under whom device makers have promised to use Matter as the industry standard for future products. Consumers shopping for smart home devices will be able to operate all of them within the same gateway, so long as they carry the Matter logo. Matter will become the industry standard in 2023.

The CSA is composed of tech giants such as Google, Amazon, and Apple, so there is some serious backing behind the standard. Experts believe that it will be in wide use by 2024 or 2025.

Matter will ensure that not only are smart home devices connected to the internet, but that their devices can talk to each other and co-exist in a safe and sustainable way.

Understanding Virtual PBX for Your Business

February 23, 2022 / palmira voelkerding

More and more companies are embracing the potential of VoIP technology to transform their office communications. Gone are the days of relying on old phone lines and complex networks that require switchboards to get to the intended recipient. Voice over Internet Protocol integrate your office communications in a streamlined way for maximum efficiency.

The next step in this evolution is a virtual PBX system, or private branch exchange. This is a private telephone network for your organization that allows you to make calls within your organization without having to field outside interruptions. A virtual PBX system is hosted on a digital network, so there is no need for costly cellular data or maintenance on a physical network. Here’s everything you need to know about this innovative communications solution.

What is a Virtual PBX?

Companies have been using PBX systems for decades, initially as a closed landline network that served large office buildings. Remember calling a business and being told to enter the extension you were trying to reach? This served its purpose for the time, but it had limitations, like having to worry about busy signals and full mailboxes.

When they were replaced by closed cellular networks, they became easier for users to navigate, but costlier for the businesses to maintain. Most businesses run on the cloud now, and virtual PBX systems are no exception. Many integrate the entire office communications network on the same server, and are controlled by software that allows people to communicate on multiple platforms. Hosted VoIP systems are ideal for large companies that expect to be in frequent communication inside and outside of the office, and many third-party companies provide this service to interested tech companies.

Benefits of Virtual PBX

Less Hardware

One of the biggest benefits of virtual PBX systems is that there is much less maintenance and technology to keep track of. A closed traditional phone network has many potential points of failure, from a local outage at the phone plant to a stray hamster chewing through some wires. Not only can it be costly to repair, but it may also take time to find the source of the glitch. With no dedicated hardware or infrastructure needed for a cloud-based system, you can rely on someone else for tech support.

Easy to Set Up

Unlike other phone systems, there should be little to no setup needed in the office, particularly if you’re an established business with a dedicated internet network. You should be able to take advantage of your established cloud-based computing and task management software and integrate them into a new communications system. This will not only require fewer people working in your office, but it should be up in a short time with the help of the right provider.

Lower Cost

If you’re looking to save money on your communications setup, virtual PBX might be the right move. For one thing, you won’t be paying a team of workers to set up a physical phone line through your building, and you won’t be installing a whole new computer system. You’ll likely also save money in the long run if you get a system that doesn’t charge per message like many cellular systems do. For a busy company, internal communications can total hundreds or thousands of messages a day—and those costs can add up quickly if you are not on unlimited plans.

Unified Communications

Your VoIP system is just one part of how a virtual PBX system can help you. These systems can integrate your entire communication network under one umbrella, connecting your phone with your email systems, instant messaging, and even your fax machine. It provides voice and video chatting and can integrate advanced features like call recording and automatic assistants to screen calls before they get to a person.

Scalability

If your company rapidly expands, your phone network might become overwhelmed, causing missed messages and long wait times for frustrated customers. Virtual PBX systems aren’t confined by physical space and can expand when needed. Your cloud services provider will offer packages for companies of different sizes, and it’s easy to upgrade when needed.

Upgrade Your Communications Today

Virtual PBX systems are the wave of the future, especially for companies with a growing need for fast in-network communications. The time is right to upgrade your old network and make communicating with your team more accessible than ever. Why not take the leap today?

Top Car Technologies Coming In The Next 10 Years

November 28, 2021 / Chris Monterose

Cars aren’t the same as they were ten years ago, and they certainly won’t be the same as they are today ten years from now. New technologies will make vehicles better—perhaps even so much so that even the best lemon law attorney won’t have much of anything to do! Read on, and discover how automobiles might be changing over the course of the next decade.

Cooled Seats

We’ve all ridden in or heard about cars with heated seating before, but what if the opposite were possible as well? It could be true with the advent of air-conditioned car seats, a technology whose inclusion has eluded automakers up until recently.

With the inclusion of a breathable fabric on the car seats, air can now circulate and cool the occupant of said seat. The flow of air can be aided by a system of fans positioned underneath each seat, which also helps to vent air away from the occupant as well.

Vehicle-to-Vehicle Communication

You might have also heard this term before in its abbreviated form—V2V Comms. This technology is poised, according to the NHTSA, to allow cars on the road to “wirelessly exchange information about the speed and position of surrounding vehicles shows great promise in helping to avoid crashes, ease traffic congestion, and improve the environment.”

Down the road, bicycles and pedestrians might even make use of this technology, allowing motorists to detect them more easily and avoid deadly accidents.

Front-View Cameras

We already have rear-view cameras, why not stick some in the front too? Now, this might seem like a superfluous addition at first, but think about the extra utility that most drivers will be able to get out of one of these. With a 180-degree field of view, motorists will be able to detect pretty much everything in their surroundings. If nothing else, that should make it much easier to avoid accidents and feel more confident while you’re out and about.

Smart Headlights

Imagine headlights that adjust light levels on their own? Such is the promise of so-called “smart headlights.” If implemented on a wide scale, these could automatically detect oncoming traffic and then adjust brightness to avoid blinding other drivers while still allowing you to see the road. Once again, the potential to reduce accidents makes this attractive technology.

AR Dashboards

You might actually find the first iterations of this technology in use on some high-end luxury vehicles. Augmented Reality (AR) dashboards project a heads-up visual display over the windshield of the vehicle that can keep the driver informed about their speed, heading, and other important details. More advanced functionality could even allow for the controlling of onboard entertainment systems, maps, communications, etc.

Vehicle Autonomy

Perhaps the crown jewel of vehicle enhancements, the dream for many automakers now is to create a fully autonomous vehicle and get it out on the road. We’ve already seen some manufacturers push toward Level 3 autonomous vehicles, and with the right legal frameworks in place, it’s only a matter of time until those Level 4 and 5 vehicles finally hit the road.

Technology Trends Shaping The CNC Machining Industry

November 27, 2021 / Chris Monterose

CNC machining is a modern manufacturing mainstay. The process, which traces its roots back to the first numerical control machines of the 1940s, has only risen in popularity since its inception, and over the coming years, there are a number of new developments on the horizon. Today, we’re going to take a look at some of those new trends, technologies, and innovations that will be shaping the CNC machining industry for the foreseeable future.

Cost Savings Through Mechanical Enhancements

There are a number of improvements coming to CNC machining that could help control costs. Take, for example, the increasing number of axes included on modern CNC machines.

In the past, 3-axis machines were the standard, which allowed the bed to move linearly along two axes while the spindle translates up and down along the third axis.

Now, with the introduction of 5 and 6-axis machines, whole new levels of maneuverability are possible, which means that the components produced by CNC machines can be even more intricate and precise. And it’s not just the complexity that’s improved—having more axes helps to reduce the production times on jobs, which, in turn, can help cut down on costs.

More Robotics Means More Versatility

The use of robots isn’t exactly new to CNC machining. Recent innovations, however, are going to transform the nature of the industry and help improve efficiency. A prime example is a creation known as “collaborative robots,” or “cobots.” These robots are designed to work with human operators and augment their productivity.

Cobots can be programmed and trained, and from there will aid their human coworkers and help improve the versatility of the organization employing them.

Better Training Will Create A Better Industry

As tools and technology change, so too must the skills of workers throughout the industry. Manufacturers realize this, and are increasingly investing in solutions that can better train employees to do their jobs such as the citb test booking. Software integration in CNC machining equipment, for instance, can help to guide operators through various processes until they become second nature.

These better-trained workers will commit fewer errors and work at quicker rates, so even if the startup costs of improved training are substantial, the long-term savings of both time and money for the manufacturer make the investment well worth it.

The Rise Of Manufacturing As A Service

Manufacturing as a service (MaaS) makes use of the outsourcing of specific tasks and responsibilities to another party, which, implemented properly, can generate a whole host of positive effects. Companies utilising MaaS are more agile, more productive, and are able to drive down costs through a reduction in labor expenses.

With so many associated benefits, it’s likely that we’ll see an increase in the number of companies making use of MaaS. Especially in the midst of the Coronavirus pandemic, where organizations are looking to expand their networks, mitigate supply chain breakdowns, and find solutions for precision manufacturing. Fictiv is a digital manufacturing ecosystem that rapidly delivers custom parts on-demand, to help companies accelerate new product introduction.

Continued Expansion Of The Industrial Internet Of Things

Manufacturers have been able to use the Industrial Internet Of Things (IIoT) to network some of their machines, send/receive data, and remotely monitor/manage operations. This ability for machines to communicate without a human operator can help make manufacturing processes safer and faster, while simultaneously improving quality.

There will likely be a greater adoption of these systems in the coming years, combined with the integration of process automation and other methods to improve efficiency and cut waste.

Using Gaming Technology Can Dramatically Change The Car Industry

November 24, 2021 / Chris Monterose

You might be wondering what the video gaming industry and the car design industry have in common, or how the two could work together to create new and exciting car designs. As it turns out, their shared interest lies in a program called Unreal Engine. This technology is bringing these two industries together in some amazing ways.

What Is Unreal Engine?

Unreal Engine is the world’s top real-time 3-D creation tool for designing games, architecture, simulations, automobiles, and so much more. With this ground-breaking program, you can create realistic 3-dimensional images of anything your imagination can come up with. It’s being used by the film and television industry to create images that are indistinguishable from reality.

It’s been used for years to create cutting-edge graphics in popular games like Fortnite and even remakes of old classics. Now other industries are taking notice, and among them is the car industry which will use the software platform to design hyper-realistic 3-D images of concept vehicles.

How the Video Game Platform is Being Used in the Car Industry

Although computer-aided-design has been around for over 20 years, the car industry has relied on clay models for showcasing new car designs all this time. This not only was more time consuming, but made it difficult to share creations with people across the globe. However, this 3-D technology allows for simpler creation of ultra-realistic images.

Car designers can also use the

Unreal Engine to showcase their newest creations in life-like 3-D movie quality scenery, like those in blockbuster movies. Advertisers can more efficiently and safely place the newest car in any location or situation they can dream of.

For example, Volkswagen recently did a commercial in the Hyperbowl in Germany using LED walls to create a backdrop that looked exactly like a real location. It was a stunning display and an excellent way to advertise new concepts.

The use of virtual technology also allows manufacturer’s and agencies to examine crash test data in response to new and proposed safety features. These models are a far way’s off from full implementation, but could potentially help save lives as Unreal Engine continues to be adopted.

The system would need input from experts like this San Francisco car accident attorney and top safety organizations like the NHSTA to reach an appropriate level of accuracy. This end of the collaboration is yet to be seen, however.

How the Unreal Engine Technology Can Help the Consumer

One of the coolest features for the potential car buyer is being able to customize and virtually test drive your vehicle from the comfort of your own home. Imagine being able to choose the style, color, and safety features of your car model and then the environment to test drive their choice.

What Does the Future Hold?

For now, the possibilities are endless. Not only are engineers and designers able to create new vehicle concepts, but even the average consumer can create designs as well. You don’t need technological know-how either, Unreal Engine offers courses in how to get started using this software engine.

In a one-hour course, Paul Kind will teach you how to jump into your first interactive experience. You’ll learn the basics of getting started with the program to begin creating stunning virtual worlds brimming with detail.

As for the car industry, only time will tell how this new collaboration will unfold. One thing’s for sure, though, consumers can expect to see a brand new car buying experience in the near future.

How Vintage Furniture Is The New Design Trend

November 22, 2021 / Full Editorial

In 2020, people spent more time at home than they had spent in any other period in recent history. Spending so much time at home made people more aware of their household furnishings and more eager to transform them so that they fit their vision of where they wanted to live and work. With remote and hybrid models of work likely to be an important part of our lives for the foreseeable future, people will continue to invest in their households at higher levels than in past years. One area where people have invested heavily is in furniture. According to a new report, in 2020, spending on furniture and appliances rose from $373 billion to $405 billion year-over-year. The shift to working from home and shopping online drove growth in ecommerce, and one of the fastest growing segments in ecommerce was the vintage and consignment market. Vintage furniture became and has remained the most important design trend of our times.

Chairish, the vintage furniture ecommerce platform, enjoyed a 60% growth in sales. 1stDibs, an ecommerce company that sells luxury items such as furniture, earned a 23% increase in its revenue. Kaiyo, a platform for buying and selling used furniture, has experienced triple-digit growth, month-over-month.

An obvious answer is that second-hand furniture is affordable, and in a time of economic distress, people would shift their purchases towards cheaper alternatives to goods that they need. However, collectible and heritage items performed strongly during that period too. For instance, 1stDIbs sold out its stock of Ray and Chalres Eames’ Lounge Chair, the Ultrafragola mirror and Mario Bellini’s Camaleonda Sofa. Users of the Chairish platform have turned a profit on items such as Michel Ducaroy’s Toga sofa. According to its annual report, Kaiyo sold the DDC On the Rocks sofa at a staggering $18,346 price. This really shows the strength of the collectibles and heritage segment.

Experts predict that the vintage and second hand furniture market will be even stronger in the coming years. According to Statista, the furniture resale market will grow 3.5 times faster than traditional retail, by 2025, appreciating by 54% between 2021 and 2025.

An important reason for the growth in the sector is the change in attitudes toward secondhand goods. This change in attitude has come at a time when platforms such as Depop, TheRealReal, and ands, have allowed millenials and Gen Z shoppers to buy used clothes. The change in attitudes extended to furniture. According to Chairish, 31% of millenials and Gen Z shoppers had a greater demand for second hand, vintage or antique furniture over the last year.
ANother factor is that mass-produced goods have started to lose their sheen. People feel increasingly disconnected from modern consumerist society and vintage furniture arouses more nostalgic emotions, and feels less embedded in consumerism. Modern designs often seem to go out of style as quickly as they get into style, whereas vintage furniture has a more enduring appeal. Younger consumers are looking for goods that express their individuality, rather than embed them in mass-consumerism, and this makes vintage furniture, and classic designs such as leather recliners Made in USA, so appealing.

What is Data Migration, and How You Can Use It

November 19, 2021 / palmira voelkerding

Data migration is a one-time operation that involves preparing, extracting, and, if necessary, changing internal data from one storage device to another.

This may sound similar to data duplication or integration, but the two processes are not the same. Data replication is the process of transferring data from one platform to another on a regular basis, whereas data integration is the process of combining data from several sources in a data storage destination or analysis tool.

Data migration is needed for a variety of projects, from upgrading a server to transferring to a new data center, and from launching a new app to integrating the capabilities of a recently acquired company. Moving information to a new system, location, or design should ideally be done with minimal human manipulation of data or re-creation and no data loss.

You can find a project data migration tool in a variety of shapes and sizes.

Organizations can employ on-premises or cloud-based technologies or develop their own data migration programs. Self-scripted data transfer is a do-it-yourself in-house option that works well for small tasks but not for larger enterprises. Since all of the data is stored in one location, on-premises tools perform well. For enterprises migrating data to a cloud-based destination, cloud-based data migration technologies may be a preferable option.

IT professionals can create software to move data, but it’s a laborious and time-consuming operation. Manual integration chores and re-implementation of algorithms are occasionally the outcomes of hand-coding massive data integrations.

It is preferable to use data migrating software. Although the software takes care of the heavy work, data engineers must still understand what data they are migrating, how much data will be transferred, and the variations between the source and destination platforms and schemas. They must plan the migration, execute the relocation, test the results, and address any difficulties that arise.

How do you choose the best data migrating tool?

The most critical component of any data migration endeavor is proper planning, which should encompass data sources and destination, security, and economic considerations. The choice of a data migration technology is an important part of the planning, and it should be founded on the use case & business objectives of the organization.

Sources and destinations of data

A significant aspect is the number and type of data sources and destinations. Self-scripting could be able to handle any source or destination, but it isn’t scalable. It might work for minor projects, but developing data extraction routines for hundreds of sources is probably not a good idea.

The supported sources and destinations for on-premises tools may vary based on the operating platform on which your tool operates.

Most data migration systems, both on-premises and in the cloud, can handle a wide range of data sources and destinations. Cloud-based SaaS solutions have no OS restrictions, and providers automatically upgrade them to support the new releases of sources and destinations.

Reliability

Because of their highly redundant structures, cloud-based data migration systems have near to 100 percent uptime. On-premises equipment would struggle to reach that level of dependability.

Scalability and performance

Cloud-based migration technologies are extremely effective. Cloud computing and storage can scale to meet the needs of dynamic data movement. Because the equipment on which they run is constrained, on-premises tools cannot autonomously scale up and down as needed.

How To Compete In The Leather Upholstery Market

November 18, 2021 / Full Editorial

Demand for leather furniture has been steadily growing for many years. Expects estimate that the market will grow at a rate of 3.9% compounded over the 2020 to 2027 period. More optimistic reports suggest that the industry will grow at a rate of 5.9% compounded over the 2021 to 2028 period, achieving a value of some $626 billion by 2028. Millenials and the emerging cohort of Gen Z buyers, have developed an affinity for leather furniture, and the quality of the product has many things in its favour. Leather is one of the most durable materials out there, and that, coupled with its texture and looks, means that when it comes to conserving value, there is no better product out there on the market. A key driver of growth is that over the forecast period, consumers are expected to enjoy rising disposable income, allowing them to take advantage of the benefits of owning leather furniture. With growth predicted to continue for the next few years, it is no surprise that many entrepreneurs have entered the market to compete for their slice of the market. Increased competition in the market is not the only problem that manufacturers face. We are living in an age of supply chain disruptions, labor shortages, and a consumer that is more price conscious than ever. Competing in this industry is one of the big questions facing upholsters and a question that I will try to answer in this article.

Manufacturers will have to embrace a new way of doing business. A decade ago, venture capitalist Marc Andressedn declared that, “software is eating the world”, and since then, his declaration has proved prophetic, with industry after industry increasingly mediated by software. The leather furniture industry is not outside of this movement. Manufacturers have to realise that they have to embrace the use of digital technology to generate efficiencies, improve the customer experience, unearth insights to improve their product quality, and ultimately, to earn higher economic profits. With 30% of consumers who purchase leather furniture being between 25 and 34 years of age, there is certainly a massive opportunity to capture consumers who will be on the market for decades to come.

Process optimization and automation are two of the most powerful ways that manufacturers can use to improve their profitability. For instance, the Lectra Versalis 4.0-ready digital cutting solutions enables manufacturers to improve their competitiveness through four improvements:

Increased product quality
Higher yield, reducing costs and optimising pricing
Greater productivity at a time of labor shortages and where time-to-market has to be slashed
More efficient processes thanks to data leveraging

Manufacturers need to leverage such solutions, as well as work with innovators who can provide them with adequate support and guidance to deliver the efficiencies that technology promises. The result of an approach that is open to innovation can be seen in products such as the Bradington Young recliner, which is made in the most efficient way possible, while delivering value to the customer.