Whether you’re a high school graduate exploring manufacturing careers, or an operations manager hungry for an understanding of the newest manufacturing technologies, this specialization will provide a foundation in how digital advances are changing the landscape and capabilities of factories. Nine courses – developed with input from the manufacturing industry – touch on Industry 4.0 and its components, including digital manufacturing and design practices, the concept of the digital thread, the Internet of Things and Big Data. To learn more about the Digital Manufacturing and Design Technology specialization, please watch the overview video by copying and pasting the following link into your web browser: https://youtu.be/wETK1O9c-CA
Digital Manufacturing & Design Technology Specialization
Understand Manufacturing’s Fourth Revolution. Learn how manufacturing is evolving with advances in digital-based technology.
Offered By
University at Buffalo
The State University of New York
How the Specialization Works
Take Courses
A Coursera Specialization is a series of courses that helps you master a skill. To begin, enroll in the Specialization directly, or review its courses and choose the one you'd like to start with. When you subscribe to a course that is part of a Specialization, you’re automatically subscribed to the full Specialization. It’s okay to complete just one course — you can pause your learning or end your subscription at any time. Visit your learner dashboard to track your course enrollments and your progress.
Hands-on Project
Every Specialization includes a hands-on project. You'll need to successfully finish the project(s) to complete the Specialization and earn your certificate. If the Specialization includes a separate course for the hands-on project, you'll need to finish each of the other courses before you can start it.
Earn a Certificate
When you finish every course and complete the hands-on project, you'll earn a Certificate that you can share with prospective employers and your professional network.
There are 9 Courses in this Specialization
Course1
Digital Manufacturing & Design
4.6
538 ratings
This course will expose you to the transformation taking place, throughout the world, in the way that products are being designed and manufactured. The transformation is happening through digital manufacturing and design (DM&D) – a shift from paper-based processes to digital processes in the manufacturing industry. By the end of this course, you’ll understand what DMD is and how it is impacting careers, practices and processes in companies both large and small.
You will gain an understanding of and appreciation for the role that technology is playing in this transition. The technology we use every day – whether it is communicating with friends and family, purchasing products or streaming entertainment – can benefit design and manufacturing, making companies and workers more competitive, agile and productive. Discover how this new approach to making products makes companies more responsive, and employees more involved and engaged, as new career paths in advanced manufacturing evolve.
Main concepts of this course will be delivered through lectures, readings, discussions and various videos.
This is the first course in the Digital Manufacturing & Design Technology specialization that explores the many facets of manufacturing’s “Fourth Revolution,” aka Industry 4.0, and features a culminating project involving creation of a roadmap to achieve a self-established DMD-related professional goal.
To learn more about the Digital Manufacturing and Design Technology specialization, please watch the overview video by copying and pasting the following link into your web browser: https://youtu.be/wETK1O9c-CA
Course2
Digital Thread: Components
4.5
215 ratings
This course will help you recognize how the "digital thread" is the backbone of the digital manufacturing and design (DM&D) transformation, turning manufacturing processes from paper-based to digital-based. You will have a working understanding of the digital thread – the stream that starts at product concept and continues to accumulate information and data throughout the product’s life cycle – and identify opportunities to leverage it.
Gain an understanding of how "the right information, in the right place, at the right time" should flow. This is one of the keys to unlocking the potential of a digital design process. Acknowledging this will enable you to be more involved in a product’s development cycle, and to help a company become more flexible.
Main concepts of this course will be delivered through lectures, readings, discussions and various videos.
This is the second course in the Digital Manufacturing & Design Technology specialization that explores the many facets of manufacturing’s “Fourth Revolution,” aka Industry 4.0, and features a culminating project involving creation of a roadmap to achieve a self-established DMD-related professional goal.
To learn more about the Digital Manufacturing and Design Technology specialization, please watch the overview video by copying and pasting the following link into your web browser: https://youtu.be/wETK1O9c-CA
Course3
Digital Thread: Implementation
4.6
143 ratings
There are opportunities throughout the design process of any product to make significant changes, and ultimately impact the future of manufacturing, by embracing the digital thread. In this course, you will dig into the transformation taking place in how products are designed and manufactured throughout the world. It is the second of two courses that focuses on the "digital thread" – the stream that starts at the creation of a product concept and continues to accumulate information and data throughout the product life cycle.
Hear about the realities of implementing the digital thread, directly from someone responsible for making it happen at a company. Learn how the digital thread can fit into product development processes in an office, on a shop floor, and even across an enterprise. Be prepared to talk about the benefits, and limitations, of enacting it.
Main concepts of this course will be delivered through lectures, readings, discussions and various videos.
This is the third course in the Digital Manufacturing & Design Technology specialization that explores the many facets of manufacturing’s “Fourth Revolution,” aka Industry 4.0, and features a culminating project involving creation of a roadmap to achieve a self-established DMD-related professional goal.
To learn more about the Digital Manufacturing and Design Technology specialization, please watch the overview video by copying and pasting the following link into your web browser: https://youtu.be/wETK1O9c-CA
Course4
Advanced Manufacturing Process Analysis
4.3
183 ratings
Variability is a fact of life in manufacturing environments, impacting product quality and yield. Through this course, students will learn why performing advanced analysis of manufacturing processes is integral for diagnosing and correcting operational flaws in order to improve yields and reduce costs.
Gain insights into the best ways to collect, prepare and analyze data, as well as computational platforms that can be leveraged to collect and process data over sustained periods of time. Become better prepared to participate as a member of an advanced analysis team and share valuable inputs on effective implementation.
Main concepts of this course will be delivered through lectures, readings, discussions and various videos.
This is the fourth course in the Digital Manufacturing & Design Technology specialization that explores the many facets of manufacturing’s “Fourth Revolution,” aka Industry 4.0, and features a culminating project involving creation of a roadmap to achieve a self-established DMD-related professional goal.
To learn more about the Digital Manufacturing and Design Technology specialization, please watch the overview video by copying and pasting the following link into your web browser: https://youtu.be/wETK1O9c-CA
Instructors
Amy Moore
Project Manager & Act-Authorized Job ProfilerUniversity at Buffalo: The Center for Industrial Effectiveness (TCIE)
Ken English
Deputy DirectorSustainable Manufacturing and Advanced Robotic Technologies Community of Excellence
Sara Behdad
Assistant ProfessorMechanical and Aerospace Engineering, Industrial and Systems Engineering
Shambhu Upadhyaya
ProfessorComputer Science and Engineering
Rahul Rai
Associate ProfessorMechanical and Aerospace Engineering
Industry Partners
About University at Buffalo
The University at Buffalo (UB) is a premier, research-intensive public university and the largest, most comprehensive institution of the State University of New York (SUNY) system. UB offers more than 100 undergraduate degrees and nearly 300 graduate and professional programs.
About The State University of New York
The State University of New York, with 64 unique institutions, is the largest comprehensive system of higher education in the United States. Educating nearly 468,000 students in more than 7,500 degree and certificate programs both on campus and online, SUNY has nearly 3 million alumni around the globe.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the refund policy?
Can I just enroll in a single course?
Yes! To get started, click the course card that interests you and enroll. You can enroll and complete the course to earn a shareable certificate, or you can audit it to view the course materials for free. When you subscribe to a course that is part of a Specialization, you’re automatically subscribed to the full Specialization. Visit your learner dashboard to track your progress.
Is financial aid available?
Can I take the course for free?
Is this course really 100% online? Do I need to attend any classes in person?
This course is completely online, so there’s no need to show up to a classroom in person. You can access your lectures, readings and assignments anytime and anywhere via the web or your mobile device.
How long does it take to complete the Specialization?
Time to completion can vary based on your schedule, but learners can expect to complete the Specialization in 7 to 10 months.
What background knowledge is necessary?
There is no background knowledge, in particular, that is necessary to take this course. We recommend at least a high school education and interest in how an idea becomes a prototype, a prototype becomes a product, and a product becomes a consumable.
Do I need to take the courses in a specific order?
We strongly urge you begin by taking the following three courses first, in this order: Digital Manufacturing & Design, Digital Thread: Components, and Digital Thread: Implementation. The MBSE: Model-Based Systems Engineering course should be taken at the very end. Everything in between may be taken in any order desired.
Will I earn university credit for completing the Specialization?
No.
What will I be able to do upon completing the Specialization?
Upon Specialization completion, you will have determined your skill levels in relation to the digital manufacturing and design industry, identified a future manufacturing career path that you are interested in pursuing, and examined the community in which you live to recognize and embark on the opportunities that exist. Additionally, you will gain the confidence to have intelligent, fact-based dialogues, either in informal or professional conversations, about:
· How advances in technology are shaping the "factory of the future" in a new phase of industrial revolution popularly referred to as "Industry 4.0," which encompasses the Internet of Things (IoT). The fusion of technologies resulting in IoT will make our lives more exciting, intelligent, interactive and innovative than ever before!
· Social factors like the US-China trade imbalance and accelerated technology obsolescence that are driving the need for disruptive innovation in the manufacturing world.
· The world of the "Digital Thread," where design of a new product and its manufacturing can occur simultaneously (instead of in sequence), resulting in significantly faster product launches, superior quality and competitive prices.
· The unimaginably large amount of data that the next generation of manufacturing will handle, and how "super computers" and "high power computing" will be able to transform it into actionable information with ease, speed and accuracy.
· How robots are used to make rapid and reliable decisions, consequently making the production shop floor into an "Intelligent Machining" environment.
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