175 Stephen Fitzpatrick: remanufacturing as a strategic capability

Stephen Fitzpatrick is Director of the Digital Factory at the National Manufacturing Institute Scotland, based at the University of Strathclyde, and Director of the Remake Value Retention Centre, a new £10m initiative commissioned by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI).

A key focus of Stephen’s work is developing solutions that enable a circular economy, particularly in high-value, high-integrity sectors.

‘High-integrity sectors’ are industries that require strict adherence to safety and reliability standards, often because the potential consequences of failure are huge – we can think about aerospace, automotive, nuclear power, wind, and other industries where ensuring safety, performance and up-time is critical.

Stephen believes that combining digital technologies with remanufacturing is crucial, both to maximise the life of existing products, and to support designing and manufacturing new products in a way that optimises circular opportunities and value.

Stephen leads a multidisciplinary team of 75 engineers and scientists, specialising in Digital Manufacturing, Design Engineering, Additive and Repair Manufacturing, Robotics and Metrology Systems. 

Stephen highlights the concept of value retention as another way we can change our thinking. Value retention is a hierarchy of processes, and as Stephen explains, the concept was set out by Professor Nabil Nasr in a report for the United Nations International Resource Panel, back in 2018.

Stephen tells us how remanufacturing is evolving in different sectors – some of which have been remanufacturing for decades.

We discuss the challenges and barriers to remanufacturing… and how remanufacturing creates value opportunities both for OEMs – original equipment manufacturers – and for independent remanufacturers.

Stephen explains how supply chain disruptions are pushing remanufacturing up the agenda as businesses realise it can increase resilience, and he shares some of the ways that digital technology is opening up new possibilities and supporting value opportunities through smarter information and decisions.