At Johnson & Johnson, artificial intelligence (AI) has been used in a myriad of ways—from sorting through data to helping the company efficiently establish safety and effectiveness guardrails when it is doing clinical trials.
“AI has been used effectively in a number of areas, ranging from the drug development process to restocking hospitals,” writes Kathyrn Wengel, executive vice president and chief technical operations and risk officer at Johnson & Johnson and chair of the board at the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM). “It helps us sort through massive amounts of data, yielding insights for the improved health and wellness of people around the world. It aids us in creating targeted treatments and getting them to the right patients at the right time.
“… Overall, it helps our people do a better job of living up to our commitment of improving healthcare outcomes and making our towns, country, and world a better place,” Wengel said in a letter to readers in a NAM report called “Working Smarter: How Manufacturers Are Using Artificial Intelligence.”
Key Insights
The 16-page report released in May 2024 includes the following key insights into how AI is reshaping manufacturing:
- AI tools are being used widely across industries and are important to advancing modern manufacturing.
- Manufacturers consume, develop, and deploy AI throughout their production processes.
- AI’s potential in manufacturing is expansive and can help industry leaders improve efficiency, product development, safety, predictive maintenance, and supply chain logistics.
- AI refers to a large umbrella of technologies that include machine learning, machine vision, and deep learning.
- AI programs are being deployed and tested in ways that keep workers as the central drivers and decision-makers.
- To remain a global leader in advancing AI and supporting manufacturing innovation, the United States should take a cautious approach to AI regulation.
The report also outlines how manufacturers are using AI in their operations, with manufacturing and production topping the list at 39%.
Insights Into Policies
The technology is evolving quickly and policymakers should foster initiatives that support manufacturing growth and AI innovation, according to the report, which was written by Mary Frances Holland, associate director for economic research for NAM.
“Further, policymakers should leverage the industry’s expertise throughout the policymaking process,” the report says. “A policy ecosystem that supports innovation and growth in manufacturing AI will bolster U.S. competitiveness and leadership in this critical emerging field.”
The report then outlines these approaches to policymaking:
- Policymakers should review existing laws before enacting new ones.
- AI regulations should be context-specific because AI uses are context-specific. “To the extent that regulations will be developed, they should differentiate among the variety of use cases of AI,” the report says.
- Policymakers should be mindful of potential compliance burdens.
- Policymakers should leverage industry standards and best practices when possible so the U.S. can remain a leader in AI development. “The U.S. must take the lead in passing and enforcing AI policy that is transparent, democratic, and inclusive of the industry to defend against approaches that are top-down, opaque, or overly restrictive,” the report says.
- It encourages policymakers to invest in research and development and workforce pathways. “Policymakers should support the industry’s moves toward digitization and Manufacturing 4.0 by supporting the career and technical education institutions that train the industry’s shop floor workforce,” the report says.
- The report also calls for protecting personal data on a federal level. “Maintaining the privacy of personal data is important to manufacturers, who resoundingly support efforts to craft a federal privacy law that would advance individuals’ privacy, prevent a patchwork of state privacy laws and provide much needed legal clarity to support continued innovation and competitiveness,” the report says. “Any such standard should take a risk-based approach to data privacy while also protecting manufacturers from frivolous litigation.”
The bottom line, Wengel says in her letter, is that policymakers must develop sensible, carefully thought-out frameworks for various AI applications, leaning on manufacturers’ experience to engineer those frameworks.
“We need a policy environment that supports innovation and growth in manufacturing AI because it will bolster U.S. competitiveness and leadership in this critical emerging field,” Wengel says. “All possible futures for modern manufacturing in the U.S. involve AI.”
Thomas A. Barstow is senior editor of FlexPack VOICE®.