Korean tire manufacturer Kumho Tire is employing passive ultrahigh-frequency (UHF) RFID tags to track its consumption of the rubber materials that it uses to assemble tires at two of its factories.

You're probably getting desensitized by now to the ever-lengthening list of data breach headlines which have saturated the news for the past couple of years. Targeted attacks, persistent threats and the like usually end up with the hackers capturing sensitive IP, customer information or trade secrets. The result? Economic damage, board level sackings and a heap of bad publicity for the breached organization. But that's usually where it ends.

Amazon is taking aim at delivery services like Postmates with the launch of a program called Flex., which calls for drivers to make $18 to $25 per hour delivering packages to users of Amazon Prime Now using their own cars and phones.

H.D. Smith is using cloud analytics software to get a better handle on its supply chain, allowing it to slice and dice inventory by profit margin and customer as well as track the shipping route of prescriptions and health and other wellness products.

It has been roughly four decades since industrial robots - with mechanical arms that can be programmed to weld, paint and pick up and place objects with monotonous regularity - first began to transform assembly lines in Europe, Japan and the U.S. Yet walk the floor of any manufacturer, from metal shops to electronics factories, and you might be surprised by how many tasks are still performed by human hands - even some that could be done by machines.

Harnessing data is crucial: Two-thirds of companies participating in a 2012 MIT Sloan survey said using analytics gave them a competitive edge. Most factories could use the boost.