Industry is the backbone of the European economy. Enabling technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) and digital twins (DT) are powering remarkable growth potential and driving the next generation of industry. Using these technologies, the EU-funded OPTIMAI project will strive to strike an optimal balance between fast, cheap and reliable production choices that have a big impact on the competitiveness of an industry. To this end, the project will develop smart instrumentation of production with AI-enabled sensors for quality inspection and monitoring. Using AI models, collected data will be analysed for the early detection of defects, the identification of upstream deficiencies and the reconfiguration of production parameters. To optimise production planning, the project will virtualise production using digital twins of processes and sensors.