internet of things and smart manufacturing.pdf

The Internet of things and Smart Manufacturing

Contents Executive Summary .................................................................................................................................... 2

Taking the Factory to the Future ................................................................................................................ 3

The Genesis ................................................................................................................................................ 6

The Paradigm ............................................................................................................................................. 6

The Enablers ............................................................................................................................................... 8

The Application .......................................................................................................................................... 9

Seamless and Connected Operations .................................................................................................... 9

Better Operations Visibility .................................................................................................................... 9

Robust and Optimized Shop floor Asset Management ........................................................................ 10

The Transformation .................................................................................................................................. 11

Table 1: The Factory of Today Vs. The Factory of the Future .................................................................... 7

Table 2: Enablers for Industry 4.0 .............................................................................................................. 8

Figure 1: Increased Product Customization and Tighter Project schedules ............................................. 3

Figure 2: The Evolution of Industry 4.0 ...................................................................................................... 6

Figure 3: The Paradigm of Industry 4.0 ...................................................................................................... 7

Figure 4: Connected Operations ................................................................................................................ 9

Figure 5: Enterprise Manufacturing Intelligence Software and its key characteristics ........................... 10

Figure 6: Asset Management, Enabled by Industry 4.0 ........................................................................... 10

Figure 7: Steps to Initiate a Smart Factory ............................................................................................... 11

2

Executive Summary

The internet, as a technology has now been in place for over three decades and can be claimed to be a

truly pervasive medium. The application of internet has been profound, with game changing uses in

every human endeavor, be it communication, finance, education, entertainment or travel. Businesses

have also benefited, as the internet has removed boundaries that hitherto existed like physical

distance, lack of information, access to markets or the challenges to innovation. Simply put, the world

is more connected, with the connectivity enabling better interaction.

Technology has also played a major role in the industrial sector, since the first Industrial revolution,

driven by steam and water power in the late 1880s. We have subsequently seen two major

revolutions, the advent of mass production by Henry Ford and the increasing use of electronics and

computers since the 1960s to control every aspect of the Manufacturing enterprise. We are now in the

cusp of another revolution, the era of smart manufacturing which is driven by a phenomenon called

the Internet of Things.

The Internet of Things, in a very simplistic way implies the number of devices in present use, which are

connected to the internet. By the end of 2020, it is estimated that nearly 50 billion devices will be

connected to ther internet. Many studies indicate that close to 80 % of all maufacturers will be using

IoT applications by then, leading to a potential economic impact of more than $2 Trillion. This has been

aid by corresponding market drivers as well as new and innovative product technologies.

This scenario is fundamentally changing the way manufacturers conceptualize, make and deliver their

products and services. We can confidently state that the use of IoT will become a must needed

competitive advantage; the lack of which will severely cripple the prospects of any manufacturer. This

paper is an attempt to spread awareness about the Internet of Things as a requisite tool in the hands

of every manufacturer. The paradigm of IoT is explained, along with the enablers required for

adopting smart manufacturing technologies. Some specific applications in the shop floor environment

are mentioned, along with some broad steps which could be adopted in implementing an IoT strategy.

The structure of this whitepaper is narrative with the illustration of a highly likely scenario in a plant

which makes engines, where a plant manager would seek the help of a consultant to transform a

conventional factory into a factory of the future, with the help of Smart Manufacturing techniques,

aided by the Internet of Things.

3

Taking the Factory to the Future

The factory of the future will have only two employees, a man and a dog. The man will be there to feed

the dog. The dog will be there to keep the man from touching the equipment.

Warren G Bennis

Dinesh is the head of a large plant which makes a family of car models for a leading Automobile plant. . Dinesh started his career at this company as a Graduate Trainee, 28 years ago at a time when the plant was being built. Dinesh started off in the Manufacturing Division and has since worked in roles in quality, engineering, maintenance and plant administration, rising up the rank by taking on larger responsibilities and successfully completing them . Dinesh is among the few people who have been in the organization for a long time, since its inception 30 years ago. Hence, he is highly respected and his opinions are regarded.

The first thing Dinesh likes to do as he enters office is to go through his mails. Today’s mail has a new

agenda in store for him. He has been entrusted with the task of leading a task force, set up as part of

the Company’s 30 year Anniversary Celebrations. His task force is responsible for modernizing all the

Manufacturing Facilities, as part of an initiative to spell out the future of the Company. Dinesh regards

this as a key task as it has high visibility and an impact on the future of the Company’s continued

success. There is also a personal agenda; successful completion of this activity will, for sure elevate him

to the position of Head of all Operations for the Company.

Earlier modernization efforts, which usually took place once a decade, focused on procuring new

equipment and facilities, and discarding the new ones; Dinesh wants to do something different this

time. He is particularly interested in reducing the complexity of operations, which has gradually

increased over the years without losing focus on the high productivity which has been a benchmark for

the Organization. At the same time, it would be wonderful if he could make the plant highly flexible

and agile to meet the customer requirements of getting a greater variety of products, as well as getting

them quicker. He plans to do a pilot project and implement it across the other plants.

Figure 1: Increased Product Customization and Tighter Project schedules

Dinesh is determined to come up with a novel project with high impact, which will shape the way

products are made in the Company in the future. He plans to come up with an idea and take it to his

task force to convert into a viable concept.

4

As he is about to head into his customary daily walk through the plant; he encounters the first problem

of the day. The plant’s most critical equipment, which is a stamping machine, has broken down due to

a faulty part for close to half an hour now. This equipment is critical because it is the bottleneck

equipment in the plant, that is the plant’s production rate is directly linked to it. This is the second time

that this part has failed, and the Maintenance team has not accounted for this failure rate. His

Production Control team has just reported that over half of all the vehicles that were produced last

night need to be dis-assembled, as the Production Planning team had mixed up the job cards and

hence these vehicles had been fitted with the wrong seats and the instrument panels. Added to this is

the chronic woe of high product mix this month; the change-over time has reduced the plant’s

production rate by more than 15 %. As he mulls over these points during his walk-through, Dinesh

wonders if there is a better way to Manufacture cars, or for that matter anything !

As he enters his room, thinking about the issues he needs to address, he sees a host of messages on

his mobile phone. Two messages draw his immediate attention; one from his son and another from his

Doctor. He has a Facebook notification from his son’s profile, stating that he has Checked-in at a

movie theater. Dinesh is sulking over this, as he had explicitly banned his son from watching movies till

his grades improve. Dinesh is thankful that his his son uses Facebook on his Smartphone to check into

new places; unmindful of the fact that Dinesh is tracking his movements. Moving on, Dinesh is relieved

to see a message from his Doctor saying that his mother’s health parameters, taken from their home

patient monitoring device show her health to be fine and she does not need a physical check-up this

month. As he thinks over these facts, he comes to the conclusion that the world is made much better

for the use of such smart devices. And then, there is a spark ……

Smart is the way that Dinesh wants to manufacture cars. He needs elegant solutions, which reduce the

complexity that is inherent in today’s factories. And Dinesh recognizes that making a device smart is

one terrific way to start it. But there are a lot of other factors involved ! What about the enabling

ecosystem? or the technology required to enable such smartness ? Can today’s machines do more

than just obtain instructions and also smartly detect and avoid problems? Dinesh starts jotting down

his thoughts feverishly.

Over the weekend, Dinesh flies out to his alma mater for a dinner meeting of his Graduating batch. He

is excited to catch up with his professors and particularly his classmates, as it is always good to know

how they are doing, both professionally and personally. Dinesh is an on-and-off attendee to these

meetings, but is generally in touch with most of his classmates. This time, he is pleasantly surprised to

meet Devaraj, one of his closest friends after a long gap of a decade. Devaraj joined the automotive

company along with Dinesh, but shifted to a Consulting career in Engineering and technology after 10

years. He has international work experience in diversified domains, apart from the automotive sector

and has made a mark for himself in the Engineering Services, Solutions and Systems space. Being a

former colleague of Dinesh, Devaraj naturally enquires about the happenings of his previous company,

and, in the course of the conversation Dinesh mentions his idea of wanting to make manufacturing a

whole lot smarter.

Devaraj sports a huge smile on his face and tells Dinesh that he can help him with exactly the solution

he is looking for !

An Analysis of the Problem

5

Devaraj understands the tacit requirements of the entire manufacturing lifecycle in different industries

like automotive, heavy industries, aerospace and medical, among others. He is also aware of the

significance of culture and organizational structure across different organizations across the globe, and

the influence of these factors on the way they conceive, design and make a product. Devaraj is eager

to help Dinesh.

Since Devaraj has previously worked in the same plant as Dinesh, he understands that the philosophy

of manufacturing hasn’t changed much. Dinesh briefs Devaraj about the problems he faces and

highlights complexity as the most important problem he would love to address.Devaraj is interested in

solving this problem as he can see himself and his firm delivering great value to Dinesh and his

company. They plan on meeting at Dinesh’s plant next week in order to formally start a process of

engagement. Dinesh is now excited.

The next week, Devaraj arrives at the plant early on Monday morning. The first thing that he does is to

take an unplanned and unguided tour through the shop floor, in order to fathom for himself the

culture of this plant. To enable a better understanding of the value chain, he starts from the end of the

shop floor and works his way backwards. The focus is also on a single piece of tooling, an engine

holding fixture so that he may record patterns. He first talks to the machine operators, who add direct

value to the product and then to their supervisors. He also runs into employees from other functions

like Engineering, Quality, and Maintenance & Production Control and asks them both generic and

pointed questions.

From his observations, Devaraj is able to highlight some core problems which, if addressed, would

make the plant really smart. He feels that the level of automation in the plant is low and increasing it

could help in reducing human intervention, which is often unstable and hence unreliable, particularly

in the case of deviation. He also advocates the increased use of sensors to measure key performance

measures at an individual process level. The true potential of these sensors would only be realized if

continuous feedback mechanisms are in place. Visibility also needs to be enhanced, for it not only

improves the efficiency of the plant but also provides benefits which extend to the entire supply chain

enterprise, by improving inventory management. Also, maintenance needs to be proactive and not

reactive, with the machines themselves being able to predict when they need a health check-up or

surgery. Finally, providing an unique identity to individual components would help in better

traceability would help in the case of high product mix, enabling that the component itself controls the

kind of processes that it undergoes.

Devaraj suggests that these elements are silently building a revolution in industry, particularly in

Europe and Germany. This revolution is being referred to as Industry 4.0.

6

The Genesis

Figure 2: The Evolution of Industry 4.0

The term Industry 4.0 was first used in 2011 at the Hanover Fair, the world’s biggest industry exhibition

where a set of recommendations were presented to the German Federal Government. The notion

caught on, and was supplemented by a McKinsey interview between their experts and executives of

Robert Bosch. The crux of the ideas is interconnected networks of machines, sensors and products,

resulting in intelligent value chains. The phrase 4.0 recognizes and pays tributes to the previous three

industrial revolutions, which are mentioned in the above illustration.

The Paradigm

Though the term “Industry” has many connotations, its reference in this particular perspective

encompasses the broad enterprise which is required to realize a product, both in the discrete and the

process kind of manufacturing. A typical value chain in such an industrial context would involve the

flow of both material as well as information. The paradigm shift in Industry 4.0 is the way in which

information is generated, shared and analyzed in order to address the typical manufacturing

challenges which managers like Dinesh face.

The motivation behind Industry 4.0 is to achieve specific objectives. It intends to enhance product

innovation through better feedback of the product in its usage scenario. Collaboration is enhanced

between different elements of the value chain. The manufacturing process itself is greatly enhanced,

due to better measurement, control and analysis mechanisms. And all of these are made possible due

to the evolution of cyber physical systems.

Cyber-physical systems enable physical systems to be connected in the cyber world, thus enabling

better interaction and control mechanisms. Imagine every device in the world, having its own IP

address and being able to communicate with other devices in networks. The advantages are many, and

significant! We refer to this as the Internet of Things, which will change the way we interact with

physical devices, much as the same way in which the internet has changed information and

communication systems.

7

The marriage of cyber physical systems into the manufacturing enterprise thus gives birth to the

“smart factory” or “The Factory of the Future”. There is a significant improvement in the usual

parameters by which conventional manufacturing systems are evaluated, like safety, quality, time and

cost. There are additional, path breaking benefits like flexibility, self- adaptability, self-learning,

adaptive tolerance definition and control, greater visualization and better risk management. Needless

to say, automation levels improve drastically and are also more efficient and effective. Complexity

levels would also drastically reduce in greatly spread out global operations and supply chains!

Figure 3: The Paradigm of Industry 4.0

1. Machines need to be pre-configured and adjusted for every change in product/operation. They operate independent of each other.

1. Machines work intelligently around processes, parameter/settings as well as safety mechanisms by communicating independently with other machines

2. Visualisation is extremely difficult so the plant operates in silos, each of which have their own efficiencies and hence are process driven.

2. Visualization is comprehensive, with cause-and-effect being clearly recognized. Problems crop up to the surface and, unless corrected, have the ability to stop production.

3. A great amount of time, cost, resources and engineering skill is spent around product customization. The plant can produce its run-of-the-mill products but customized products are produced separately, resulting in huge delays.

3. Optimized individual customer product manufacturing via intelligent compilation of ideal production system which factors account product properties, logistics, security, reliability, time, costs and sustainability

4. Inventory is stockpiled in order to account for variation in the process.

4. Just-in-time and lean manufacturing operations are possible as the machines plan production resources on their own

5. Human efforts and ergonomics are based on physical structure, operating mechanism & machine limitations.

5. The machine is sensitive to human factors and accommodates the humans around it.

Table 1: The Factory of Today Vs. The Factory of the Future

Industry 4.0

Connected Processes

Connected Products

Connected Plants

Connected People

The Factory of today The Factory of the future

8

The Enablers

The internet, in its various forms has been in widespread use for at least two decades now. However,

the single most important enabling factor in its increasing application in smart manufacturing has been

the corresponding up gradation of the hardware elements, specially sensors and mechatronics to a

level to which the speed, bandwidth and efficiency of the internet can be applied for real time data

gathering, process monitoring and control. Listed below is a description of the key enablers to a

successful Industry 4.0.

Table 2: Enablers for Industry 4.0

Apart from these enablers, it is imperative to have critical resources like human resources, enabling

infrastructure and the right legal and regulatory frameworks in place. Technical standards are also a

good measure of the maturity of a technology and its application, and such efforts are underway with

initiatives like the International Standard for Metadata Registries. Another interesting debate is the

choice of open vs. closed systems. Since manufacturing has traditionally been a closed system, with

production systems rarely been discussed about outside the plant, the extent of usage of open source

is in question.

Hardware

•Increased use of mechatronics for more quick, accurate and reliable performance.

•A combination of Sensors for detection and measurement; actuators for movement and control.

Internet of Things

•A standardized IP based network which connects not only the plant but also the enterprise, consisting of suppliers and customers.The kind of network could vary: WPAN, 3G, Wi-fi, LTE

•Devices and machines have their own IP addresses and can independently communicate with a central hub as well as with each other.

Software & security

•Ability to analyze complex and huge volumes of data from different sensors and use them for real time interventions.

•Security procedures like hardware encryption and network security for transit data.

•Engineering for harsh environmental conditions like heat and moisture

Big data & analytics

•A standardized IP based network which connects not only the plant but also the enterprise, consisting of suppliers and customers.The kind of network could vary: WPAN, 3G, Wi-fi, LTE

•Devices and machines have their own IP addresses and can independently communicate with a central hub as well as with each other.

9

The Application At the core of the application of Internet of Things in Manufacturing is the creative ways in which data

from sensors can be applied across all activities. With the advent of embedded sensors of all shapes,

sizes and sensory capabilities & mechanisms, deeper visibility and control of the whole process is now

feasible.

Seamless and Connected Operations The ability of Internet of Things to deliver real-time data is changing the way production systems

communicate within themselves. The complexity in these systems inherently stems from the

dependencies within each other, and most wastages, delays and mistakes often happen because the

material or the information does not reach the right process at the right time. The Internet of things

not only solves these problems but also provides a way to proactively reconfigure systems based on

the situation.

Figure 4: Connected Operations

Better Operations Visibility The Internet of Things, along with the plant network provide better visibility across all the operations

of the company. It leads to increased automation and reduces variation due to human involvement.

With the help of PLCs, both measurement and control in real time are possible. This would play an

important role in sectors like automotive, where traceability of not just the final product but also the

components which are assembled into it is required to be implemented and stored for specified

periods. The same data can also be shared with suppliers in order to improve their turnovers.

Illustrated below is an example of how a software company, EMI is implementing an Operations

Intelligence Software, for improving manufacturing operations.

Raw Material Orders

Transit details

Components/Sub-system orders;

Changes in product/engineering

Transit details

= Machine status, maintenance issues,

product flow, human resource status. Change in incoming material stock;

Production orders; field complaints

Order status, transit details,

= Inventory levels, service levels, expiry

date of products Failures and field complaints

Order status, transit details

= Apps for usage Upgrades & periodic maintenance

details; product information

Complaints, orders, returns

= Information within Information In

Information Out

10

Figure 5: Enterprise Manufacturing Intelligence Software and its key characteristics

Robust and Optimized Shop floor Asset Management Though most companies have been implementing asset management activities, the ability of machines

to now intelligently send and receive information has changed the extent to which proactive plans can

be based around them. In many cases, configuration setting as well as troubleshooting is automated,

thus reducing the burden of the Engineering and the maintenance departments as well as their need

to rely upon the equipment provider to attend to such activities. Upgrades can also be done in situ.

These capabilities are in fact, enabling more and more machine makers to move from segregated

product and service models into integrated revenue models, which also integrated them tighter into

the manufacturing company’s supply chain. A similar example could be derived from the aerospace

industry where engine makers directly monitor aircraft engine maintenance and often attend to them

directly, in interaction with the end customers, the airlines.

Figure 6: Asset Management, Enabled by Industry 4.0

11

The Transformation

Based on their discussions about the existing state of the plant as well as the potential benefits that

the application of smart manufacturing practices could provide to it, both Dinesh and Devaraj feel that

this plant is a fit case for evolution to Industry 4.0. Dinesh is committed to seeing this project through

fruition and is sure that the top management will buy into his ideas to make this a pilot factory of the

future. At the same time, he also needs to energize and educate his employees in order to jointly

achieve their goals of making this an ideal plant. Devaraj and Dinesh agree on a model of consulting

which Devaraj will provide for the plant, in the upcoming 6 months, which he feels is a reasonable

amount of time required in order to execute this project. Devaraj outlines the following broad steps

for an Internet of Things Strategy.

Figure 7: Steps to Initiate a Smart Factory

Devaraj emphasizes the need for access to personnel and information from different functions. He will

also need to talk to Dinesh’s enterprise, including his customers and suppliers. Devaraj will also suggest

modifications, if required to the flow of products to the supply chain. He will also chalk out a product

strategy which will make the use of sensors an integral part of the product architecture. With these

activities, Devaraj is confident that Dinesh’s plant will truly make a move towards being a Factory for

the future.

Devaraj works for Cyient; Dinesh could be working for you !