industry 4.0

1. 25
3/2012 marketsgermany
about us
INDUSTRY 4.0 GATHERS SPEED
M
odern information and communi-
cations technologies (ICT) like
smartphones, the mobile internet
and cloud computing have made the In-
ternet of Things vision predicted for
more than two decades a reality of eve-
ryday life. The arrival of these technolo-
gies in the industrial environment al-
lows the manufacturing industry to
significantly increase productivity, qual-
ity, and flexibility; ushering in the dawn
of the fourth industrial revolution. The
federal government is supporting both
German industry and the domestic re-
search landscape implement these
changes as part of the “Industry 4.0”
project.
“Industry 4.0” began to take off just
around the same time as the German Re-
search Center for Artificial Intelligence
(DFKI) was officially unveiling the
SmartFactoryKL
system demonstration
project at this year’s Hannover Messe.
Googling “industry” and “4.0” around
six months ago would have brought a
handful of hits, today the information
available has grown considerably.
With the SmartFactoryKL
system demon-
stration project, the DFKL is demonstrat-
ing, for the very first time, the core as-
pects of the 4th industrial revolution.
The central element in all of this is the
cyber-physical production system (CPPS).
Cyber-physical systems (CPS) are distrib-
uted, intelligent objects which are con-
nected to each other via internet technol-
ogies. In the field of production technol-
ogy this includes everything from
individual process modules and machin-
ery to facilities and even individually in-
telligent products. CPPS will revolution-
ize the factories of the future from top to
bottom and comprise the following char-
acteristic features:
•
Smart objects – Expansion of techno-
logical devices through decentralized
intelligence
•
Total networking – ­
Communication
capabilities of all smart objects within
a network
•
Use of internet standards – ­
Adaptation
of existing and proven standards for
wired and wireless communications
•
Convertible, agile production systems –
Aggregation of smart objects for broad-
ly self-configuring production systems
•
Vertical network integration – Re-
placement of strict hierarchical con-
trol architectures with increased verti-
cal integration and pervasiveness in
network structures
•
Changing human role – ­
Greater user
support through improved and mobile
access to production data and systems
connected by a user-centric and con-
text-adaptive interaction configura-
tion.
These technological considerations have
been actively pursued in the DFKI-Smart
FactoryKL
project and have already been
incorporated into the product and pro-
cess development activities of a number
of partner companies. Based on these ex-
periences, the DFKI’s Industry 4.0 experts
play an active role in supporting the im-
plementation of the Industry 4.0 project
(whether in speaking engagement or in-
dustrial project-support capacities) as
well as being on hand to answer ques-
tions from the media. Fundamental basic
technologies are also being developed
with prestigious industry representa-
tives in the Federal Ministry of Education
and Research-promoted SemProM and
RES-COM projects. Here, for example,
digital product memory is being devel-
Smart Partner. Dr. Jochen Schlick of the German Research Center for Artificial
Intelligence (DFKI) outlines a vision for the factory of the future.
oped and used in a number of different
application scenarios.
As the basis for creating new levels of
productivity and added value, the fourth
industrial revolution includes the devel-
opment and commercialization of CPS-
based autonomous, self-managing and
knowledge-based production systems.
The advent of the Internet of Things and
the Internet of Services in industrial pro-
duction makes further improvements in
the implementation of industrial pro-
cesses in production, engineering, and
supply chain and life cycle management
possible which, in their totality, will ush-
er in a new age of industrialization: In-
dustry 4.0.
Dr. Schlick has been deputy head of
Research in the DFKI’s Innovative
Factory Systems division since 2009.
He is also the research coordinator
of the SmartFactoryKL
technology
initiative.
Contact:
Dr.-Ing. Jochen Schlick
Jochen.Schlick@dfki.de
Dr. Jochen Schlick -
DFKI
The SmartFactoryKL
in action.