Future electronics production initiative to be launched at this year’s productronica
9 October 2013
News
When it opens its doors in Munich from 12 to 15 November this year, the productronica trade fair will focus special attention on a future project being dubbed ‘Industry 4.0’.
The initiative builds on the groundwork laid by the forerunner SOPRO (self-organising production) project which was introduced at productronica in 2009 to develop a platform for machines and workpieces to communicate with one another via chips and learn from each other to organise the logistics chain inside and outside the factory and to allocate their work themselves.
Whether optimised process control, automation or the intelligent planning of resources – the use of software solutions, sensors and embedded systems in electronics manufacturing is diverse. To move the entire production process forward and make it more transparent, future projects such as Industry 4.0 and production-related systems such as MES (Manufacturing Execution System) or ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) are seen as key factors for the industry. They also improve the transparency of all functions and processes that are critical to the production process.
The panel of prominent speakers at productronica’s CEO roundtable will discuss Industry 4.0 on the first day of the fair, and the Innovation Forum in Hall B2 will focus on this topic on the third day of the fair.
The project is part of the German government’s high-tech strategy which will see the country’s Ministry of Education and Research and Ministry of Economics invest 200 million Euros to help establish Germany as a leading supplier of cyber-physical systems (CPS) – autonomous, networked microsystems and the next step in embedded system development.
Important objectives in the transformation process to CPS are even stronger automation and monitoring to be able to control companies and entire added-value networks in near real time. International exhibitors of manufacturing and process software will be represented at the fair and present their solutions for the electronics industry as a basis for implementing Industry 4.0.
For more information visit www.productronica.com
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