Cloud Hosted Advanced Manufacturing and Assembly

The demand for advancements in manufacturing technology is pulled by both competitive pressures and just in time ambitions of customers. Competitive forces mandate that the costs of raw materials, resources and infrastructural requirements are all asymptoted to bare minimum. How this world continually evolving as a global village can lower each of these costs is the challenge. A solution is being sought in making man, material, and machines facilitated from cloud. The cloud thinking prescribes that the resources are available to all the prospective or current users at call where one pays for actual use. The overheads are thereby minimized. This work attempts to review the applicability of this resource and thinking, i.e., of cloud as a facilitator of just in time, mass customization to maximize value @ design to manufacture to assembly of engineered products. The paradigm is based upon utilization of innovation and cloud to add value. It attempts to qualify that Innovaluation (innovation and valuation) is the mantra for tomorrow’s competiveness or rather competence.