*By Alejandro Chocolat
High technology is increasingly playing a central role in our lives, helping us to achieve more complete and efficient experiences, especially in the digital environment. However, as digitalization advances exponentially, more industries are faced with new challenges to reinvent and sustain the delivery of their products to the physical world, while also having to master the complexity of new IT environments and the constant pressures for innovation in its processes and operations. In this scenario, the question is: how can technology help industries innovate faster and more sustainably?
In response to these challenges, one solution has been to integrate and apply Virtual Twins (Virtual Twins) to accelerate sustainable transformation towards a more circular economy with a better customer experience. Practically speaking, a Virtual Twin is a real-time, virtual representation of a product, platform or ecosystem that can be used to model, visualize, predict and provide feedback on the properties and performance of the designed item.
With this capability, Virtual Twins have been gaining ground in the modeling of complex systems, from cars and cities to human hearts. They simulate the workings of the 'product' with an accuracy that allows the user to go directly from a virtual model to the actual creation, without spending the years it would normally take to prototype and incrementally improve existing designs.
This speed to market and risk-reducing capability of complex projects explains why VirtualTwins technologies have been used in the development of 85% of the world's electric vehicles thus far, as well as contributing to more than 75% of global wind power solutions and in the search for new biomaterials. Virtual universes allow users to design, test and model new sustainable and disruptive products and processes in record time, with no physical construction demands.
The benefits of using Virtual Twins are broad and transformational, among which are new design options, with rapid prototyping, production optimization, and extended life of enhanced assets. Unlike prototypes that focus on a specific object, Virtual Twin experiences allow the visualization of various metrics and areas of expertise. They facilitate sustainable business innovation across the product lifecycle.
It is reasons like these that have led to the growth in the use of business experimentation with new digital, physical and biological technologies. From transportation to life sciences and manufacturing to retail, Virtual Twins technology is enabling companies to reconfigure their operations with an immense degree of predictability. Companies can create full-scale virtual models of their operations, networks and supply chains, providing insights into how the smallest shifts in strategy or the influence of outside forces will affect every facet of the business — in real time.
More than a commercial advantage, though, Virtual Twins can also play a big role in the planet's environmental sustainability. After all, the world is changing in ways that are impossible to ignore. We are putting increasingly dangerous pressures on the global commons and we must act quickly to avoid high-risk scenarios.
Leaders from industry, government and civil society must increasingly work together to meet our Global Goals by 2030, and this complete transformation will require everyone to find new ways of managing products – from design to end-of-life items. To do this, we must find new ways to work together to create circular economies, drive competitiveness and opportunities for responsible growth, and collectively ensure that technology revolutions deliver on their promise of greater sustainability.
The implications for sustainability at the enterprise level – and beyond – are enormous. If used correctly, these technologies can unlock extraordinary value, while benefiting the bottom line and reducing the chances of climate catastrophe. But technology can only be as effective as those who use it. The innovation is there: all it takes is the willingness of leaders to embrace it.
*Alejandro Chocolat, General Manager of Dassault Systèmes for Latin America
Notice: The opinion presented in this article is the responsibility of its author and not of ABES - Brazilian Association of Software Companies
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