Why manufacturers have everything to gain from collaborating with a specialized AI platform rather than developing in-house

Artificial intelligence (AI) has become a strategic lever for industry, whether to optimize the supply chain, automate processes, or anticipate trends through predictive analysis. Faced with mainstream solutions like ChatGPT, some companies are considering developing their own internal models, convinced that this would be more economical and just as effective. But this approach has many limitations. Working with a specialized AI platform, designed to meet the specific challenges of manufacturers, offers decisive advantages in terms of reliability, performance, and return on investment.

1. A structured and dynamic data model

General AIs like ChatGPT were not designed to handle complex industrial use cases. An expert platform is distinguished by:

• A structured data model, designed to integrate the specific features of industrial processes (regulatory constraints, business vocabulary, quality standards, etc.).
• An evolving and dynamic base, which is continually enriched thanks to field feedback and real use cases.
• An ability to connect to your internal data, ensuring relevant, reliable and contextualized responses.

Developing this type of model in-house requires months of work, rare skills, and considerable resources. Our Tracklab platform can easily integrate with your existing systems (ERP, PLM, MES) and enhances them with artificial intelligence, improving their performance and operational value.

2. Essential business and sector expertise

General-purpose artificial intelligence quickly shows its limitations when faced with the specific requirements of industrial sectors. It lacks both business precision and relevant field data. To obtain reliable results, it is essential to develop a regulatory ontology adapted to your verticals (REACH, RoHS, IATF, FDA, etc.) and to train models on your own datasets: safety data sheets (SDS), internal audits, supplier certifications, etc. This work creates a real barrier to entry, based on data quality and business expertise that is difficult to reproduce. This is where a specialized platform makes the difference:

• It incorporates in-depth knowledge of industrial issues (quality, compliance, traceability, logistics).
• It offers pre-configured use cases, tested in comparable contexts.
• It offers expert support, capable of translating your operational constraints into concrete AI solutions.

Conversely, an in-house team starting from scratch will not only need to master the technology, but also build, over time, a detailed understanding of your industry. This significantly delays operational impact. Our platform gives you access to AI specifically trained on your domain of activity, taking into account the granularity and richness of your business data.

3. Cutting-edge AI expertise

AI technologies are evolving at breakneck speed. A specialized platform constantly invests in technological monitoring and updating its models to integrate the latest innovations:

• Optimizing LLMs (Large Language Models) for your specific data.
• Integration of advanced techniques such as fine-tuning, retrieval-augmented generation (RAG) or supervised machine learning.
• Compliance with best practices in data security, ethics and compliance.

Trying to replicate this level of expertise in-house requires a team of experienced data scientists and AI engineers, which comes at a very high cost.

4. ChatGPT is not sufficient for industrial needs

ChatGPT is a powerful, yet general tool:

• It does not guarantee business relevance without complex refinement.
• It does not provide the advanced features needed for industrial environments (audit, compliance, response traceability, etc.).

An expert platform designed to combine the power of the latest AI with an architecture tailored to your industrial reality. Tracklab already collaborates with more than 100 companies in the agri-food sector and has optimized its infrastructure to precisely meet the specific needs of your business.

5. An investment that reduces risk and maximizes ROI

Developing an AI solution in-house may seem cheaper at first, but hidden costs (maintenance, updates, expertise, testing) quickly explode. To support you, a specialized platform:

• Accelerate your time to market by offering ready-to-use solutions.
• Reduces the risk of errors and non-compliance.
• Guarantees faster return on investment thanks to proven models.

In addition, an expert platform like Tracklab offers a compliance monitoring service for your company, where any AI could not provide expertise related to your challenges.

Conclusion: Your competitive advantage depends on your AI partner. In an industrial market where reliability, performance, and speed of execution make the difference, relying on a platform integrating specialized AI like Tracklab is a strategic choice. Rather than reinventing the wheel with costly and uncertain internal projects, you benefit from expertise, a robust data model, and up-to-date technology, designed for your specific needs. Our platform is the result of brainstorming between quality experts and AI engineers to offer you premium support.

Charlotte Picard

Quality Engineer | Tracklab

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