EXPONENTIAL GROWTH IN MODERN TECHNOLOGY

One of the most important things which makes digital transformation unique is the speed of change, which is commonly referred to as exponential growth.

Everyday normal human being interacts with lots of information or data. As per a study, human receive 11 million pieces of information in one second, however only 40 pieces of information can be processed by the brain. Therefore, it is a huge wasted of information compared to information gained. That is the reason, normally the human mind is more processed with a linear way of thinking. For example, the human mind is more tuned to understand a growth series of 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10 and so on. However, conceiving exponential growth is normally beyond the capacity of human imagination. For an example, the series 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64, 128, 256, 512 and so on, is a growth series where each number is getting multiplied by 2.  

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Digital technologies are evolving at an exponential pace, which is beyond the imagination of human understanding. Lack of understanding of exponential growth of digital technologies is one of the major reasons for the dilemma which the majority of the business organizations are facing, especially the manufacturing sector. The understanding of the exponential nature of digital growth may be helpful to take appropriate business decision.

Three fundamental laws are useful to provide clarity about the exponential growth of digital technology.

Moore’s Law: Gordon Moore’s law regarding processing power is one of the most significant observation to describe the exponential growth of digital technology. In 1965, he observed that, since inception in 1959, the number of components on an integrated circuit was almost doubling in every year. It was later modified that; the doubling phenomenon was occurring in every 18 months. This observation signifies that, in every 18 months, the computer would have twice as much as processing power, due to shrinking the dimension on an integrated structure. Due to this scaling phenomenon, chip functionality improved exponentially with time at about constant cost per generation. This observation of Moore remained true for the next 40 years which brought a huge positive technological and eventually social impact. But the nature of shrinking dimension came to an end as 2D lithography capability approaches atomic scale.

To overcome this issue of shrinking dimension, there can be various alternative options, such as Denser Packaging (e.g. Chip Staking in 3D using Through-Silicon-Via), Advanced Materials (e.g. Tunneling Field-Effect-Transistor, Strained Silicon, Carbon nanotubes etc.), computer architecture (e.g. advanced circuit design, Dark Silicon, etc.), Reducing Resistance (e.g. Crystalline Metals), a new way of storing and transferring of bits (e.g. topological insulators, etc.). These alternatives are going to make data processing power faster with the advancement of Moore’s law.

Moore’s law is considered as one of the fundamental theories to explain the exponential nature of technological improvement for data processing power.

Butter’s Law: As per Butter’s law, data transmit capacity by using optical fibre is getting doubled in every nine months. This phenomenon implies that the cost of data transmission by using optical fibre is getting half every nine months.

Kryder’s Law: In 2005, Scientific American journal published the Kryder’s Law which described the assumption regarding the exponential increment of data storage capacity. As per Kryder’s law, every thirteen months, disk density or areal density will be doubled. One of the major implications of this assumption will bring down storage expenditure.

There is an argument saying that Kryder’s Law is based on generalization. However, it provides a reasonable understanding of the trend of data storage capacity.

The above three laws are important because they deal with three important areas related to data: processing, communicating and storing. As per these laws, there is an exponential growth in all the areas related to data processing, communicating and storing, which ultimately lead to better digital services at rapidly reducing cost. It is a fact that the cost of digitally advanced equipment is reducing at a fast rate. For example, the cost of a top-of-the-range drone has reduced from $ 100,000 in 2007 to $500 in 2015. There are other theories as well, like Rose’s Law which is expected to bring radical changes in the digital world.

Information and more precisely, data are one of the most important entities for any organization, irrespective of nature of product or services and modus operandi. Proper collection, store, process and communication of the data within and outside the organization is useful to take appropriate decision for different purposes and different levels. That is the key to success for the organization. It is true for any business including the manufacturing sector. The manufacturing sector is the biggest user of data. With digital technologies, the importance of data is getting more visible. For example, to track manufacturing data, cloud computing and Internet of Thing (IoT) helps the manufacturer. To observe production and labour time trend, to rectify quality and maintenance issues and to minimize various safety & business-related risks data-driven manufacturing plays an important role. The manufacturing team gets more actionable information through proper collection and communication of data, which makes the system more efficient. Making use of data helps the manufacturer to identify irregularities and rectify in a very short period which enhances consistency. Data supports manufacturer to develop new product and processes. In any business, proper handling of data has multiple importance. Due to the exponential growth of digital technologies, various new data-handling tools and techniques are emerging very fast which has the potential to change the business context. Businesses who can successfully adopt and enhance their data handling capabilities in conducting business operation can place themselves much ahead from competitors. More importantly, businesses who cannot foresee the implication of rapidly increasing digital technologies or who fail to effectively implement digital transformation will eventually lag the competition