How the Tools of Quality 4.0 support the principles of TQC/TQM

Résumé:

In the context of the industry evolution, the quality function have a decisive influence on the delivery of excellent products and services to customers. In this context and especially in the 20th century, quality management systems were developed and they were established in the periods of Industry 2.0 and 3.0, bringing undeniable benefits to quality as TQC (Total Quality Control) originating in Japan and TQM (Total Quality Management) originating in the United States of America, both with the same content. In this context, quality is closely linked to the traditional quality management system, and now with Industry 4.0, , being called Quality 4.0. In this sense, the objective of this research is to verify how the Quality 4.0 tools support the TQC/TQM principles.
According to the literature review in the context of quality, TQC/TQM can be defined as a systemic and holistic approach through management processes and continuous improvement of business performance by all human resources of a company in order to explicitly and implicitly satisfy the expectations of customers and others stakeholders (Shiba et al., 1993; Dean and Bowen, 1994; Grant et al., 1994; Cristina Mele and Maria Colurcio, 2005).
With the advent of Industry 4.0, technologies promise a new wave of revolution in manufacturing and taking account on this new perspective it is important to focus on the digitization of processes in order to produce better results with minimum resources. In this context, Industry 4.0 integrates the so-called cyber-world with physical systems using embedded systems, machine-machine communication, Internet of Things and Cyber-security Systems, creating intelligent factories to interact with the complexities of modern production systems using the cyber-physical environment (Xu et al., 2018) and brings a real impact over quality systems in the organizations.

In Quality 4.0, the digitization of organization has created unique opportunities for managing quality of products and services delivered by a company. While improving traditional quality methods, Quality 4.0 is closely aligning quality management with Industry 4.0 to enable organizational efficiencies, performance, innovation and improved business models.
Technologies such as CPS (Cyber Physical System), IoT (Internet of Things), and cloud computing have been used to meet requirements in terms of quality design, quality compliance and quality performance.
In the context of Quality 4.0, its essential elements are the means that allow a revolution in the quality management system. For example, in data handling through the use of prescriptive analysis algorithms, in vertical, and horizontal integration through end-to-end systems integration, in the strategic advantage of quality through big data and analytics for decision making, in the impact of training through simulation and virtual reality, in the organizational culture through better support of top management based on agile and customer oriented decisions..

The investigation methodology was through a survey carried out with an Automobile OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) in Brazil, in order to verify the status-quo and challenges for the Quality function, considering the links for the established processes, such as TQC/TQM, and the proposal of a new concept, tools and technologies of Quality 4.0.