On behalf of VDMA and ZVEI, the Fraunhofer Institutes ISST, IOSB and IPA have now presented a preliminary study in which a blueprint for the future Manufacturing- X data ecosystem is designed and discussed. The authors pay particular attention to the specific requirements of medium-sized manufacturing companies and their expectations of a secure and at the same time profitable digital data economy.

In increasingly globally networked industrial production with its increasingly branched and therefore more complex supply chains, there is a risk that medium-sized manufacturing companies – as suppliers, traditionally a mainstay of Germany as a business location – will lose direct access to the respective end customer market. One effect of digitization in recent years is the intermediate platform economy, which is mostly operated by companies from the computer and software industry. However, they often lack a deeper understanding of production processes, production chains and upstream functions, such as preparing offers based on part geometry

Get out of the platform trap

The “Data Room Manufacturing-X” study now aims to show ways in which this trap can be avoided. With Manufacturing-X it is intended to better highlight the special features of industrial production in Germany and not to literally use an off-the-shelf data room: "In view of the fact that the growing and profitable markets of the future will invariably be of "We see in Manufacturing-X the opportunity to bring the entire equipment industry into a position that will shape the future and take it to the next level of evolution," is how the study authors characterize the project.

Their recommendations boil down to creating a federated and sovereign data space in which actors can exchange and share data in a decentralized and therefore loosely coupled manner. To do this, they analyze the existing regulations and corresponding preliminary work such as Catena-X or Gaia-X as well as the special features of production in mechanical engineering and the electrical industry. In order to achieve an overall architecture for Manufacturing-X from a single source, the authors of the study suggest, among other things, the following building blocks for the further procedure:

• Establishment of a control and project management structure as a precursor to an overarching governance organization in which all relevant sectors are represented,
• Building a Manufacturing-X open source community,
• Development of a specification and legal framework for Manufacturing-X and its flagship projects,
• Development of a procedure for the specification, implementation, testing, series production and certification of basic services,
• Building official Manufacturing-X testbeds and last but not least
• Initiation and release of "transformation projects" that establish the Manufacturing-X "house connection", i.e. support the actual realization of the connection of companies to the data room.

Maximum interoperability for many actors

“Small and medium-sized companies in particular will be able to exchange their data more easily in the future and also share it with third parties on an equal basis,” comments Gunther Koschnick, ZVEI Industry Division Manager, on the study results: “With Manufacturing-X we are relying on existing standards, be it the asset Administration Shell, the OPC UA standards in the umati environment or the use of so-called EDC connectors. Ultimately, it's about maximum interoperability for the integration of as many actors as possible." Hartmut Rauen, deputy general manager of the VDMA, points out that the construction plan presented with the study is an important milestone towards Manufacturing-X, "because the architecture of Manufacturing-X will have a decisive influence on whether.

This article was originally posted by: SPRINGERPROFESSIONAL