A while ago we have been discussing Germany's "Industry 4.0", in fact, this issue can be raised to a very high level, which is related to the future of the world's dominant player in the issue, Germany, the United States, China, the distribution of the distribution of the German industry, the United States and China, the distribution of the German industry. Germany, the United States, China, distribution encountered what opportunities and challenges? Who is most likely to control the world, it is entirely possible to start from here.
First of all, let's talk about Germany, "Industry 4.0" has indeed risen to Germany's national strategy, but even the German industry has more than 300 kinds of "Industry 4.0" different elaboration, which shows that the new thing is not casually can be defined, let alone those of us in the bureau. This shows that new things can't be defined easily, let alone outsiders like us. So hearing is not believing, seeing is believing, in order to have a say in Industry 4.0, you must personally go to Germany's front-line factories in-depth study, a glimpse of the face of the following we will follow the personal experience of a German reporter of the "Globe" magazine, while learning and discussing!
One, the future of the factory - "machine" has a soul, it can read the "product"
Siemens Amberg electronics manufacturing plant, located in the northeastern town of Bavaria, although there are only three buildings. The Siemens Amberg electronics plant in the northeastern Bavarian town of Amberg is known as a model factory for Germany's "Industry 4.0" and epitomizes the future of German industry, even though it has only three austere-looking buildings.
Amberg has one of the most advanced digital production platforms in Europe. The factory mainly produces PLC and other industrial automation products, in the whole production process, whether components, semi-finished products or products to be delivered, have their own code, in the circuit boards installed on the production line, can be automatically identified throughout each process; production of each process, including welding, assembly or logistics packaging, all process data are also recorded for traceability;
More importantly: On an assembly line, different components can be assembled automatically through pre-set control programs to produce products with different characteristics.
Because the "product" and the "machine" are "communicating", the entire production process is optimized for IT control, and production efficiency is greatly improved: Less than a quarter of the workload is handled manually, mainly data checking and recording; the plant produces three billion components per year, one product per second, an eight-fold increase in production capacity compared to the pre-digital period, and thanks to real-time monitoring and processing of all components and processes, the plant can deliver to customers within 24 hours.
In addition, because of real-time monitoring and digging to analyze quality data, the defective rate is greatly reduced. Carl Bittner, head of the plant, said the plant's quality pass rate is as high as 99.9988 percent, and "there is no other plant of its kind in the world that can achieve such a low rate of defects."
Second, automation center - the machine will also be self-renewal
Leaving Amberg, my reporter went to Remengo in northern Germany, where is the German Fraunhofer Institute of industrial automation application center, specializing in research and development for the enterprise and the production to promote "industry 4.0 "The center specializes in the development and production of equipment and solutions for companies to drive "Industry 4.0".
"In the traditional industrial era, it often took days to replace a piece of equipment in a running machine. But now we only need a few minutes. Says Jürgen Jasponet, head of the center. This is because during the installation of traditional equipment, technicians need to manually connect the new components to the working environment, and then go on to adjust the controls on the production line. Just like when working with computers decades ago. "Back then, each new component required a floppy disk with drivers that often conflicted with other components on the computer after installation, to the point where users had to make adjustments manually."
And now the advent of USB has made everything simple and easy. All we have to do is plug the new device into the computer. "Plug and play" is a vivid description of this technological advance. Industry 4.0 experts now use the term "Plug & Play" to refer to the smooth configuration of devices and systems, as in the case of the RAMONCO scenario. Like computers, the components of the future will spontaneously connect to their working environment and integrate themselves into existing control systems.
Third, will robots replace workers?
According to an independent German market research organization, as of August 2014, 70% of Germany's industrial SMEs have begun the "Industry 4.0" innovation, which mainly involves the introduction of automation and intelligent equipment for production. What kind of future does this portend?
First, there is a shift in the center of gravity of industry. Before Industry 4.0, all innovation was about reducing costs through economies of scale and employee productivity. In the future, the secret to industrial success will be how to increase productivity while shortening the design-to-market cycle, and how to meet the demand for more complex, personalized products. Mizuno's comment: Of course, this is also to meet today's people's pursuit of diversified and individualized products! Indeed, this is a world trend.
Secondly, the boundary between the virtual and the actual seems to be eliminated. For example, all production processes in the Amberg factory can be simulated in advance in the computer, and the analysis and optimization of production can be done in the virtual world.
At a glance, it seems that manual labor will be replaced by machine intelligence. The German weekly magazine Der Spiegel has published an article worrying that digitalization will take away most of the existing jobs, but the outlook is not so pessimistic. Germany's Fraunhofer Institute for Employment Economics, Wilhelm Bauer, director of the new industrial system, although the elimination of many production joints that require the participation of "people", but will also bring new problems and creative space, the future of manpower will be concentrated in the field of innovation and decision-making
Four: who mastered the big data, who will master the future!
It is precisely because of the self-improvement systems of machines that "Industry 4.0" will generate large amounts of data. According to the reporter's description: the Amberg factory, for example, has more than 1,000 online monitoring nodes on its production line, and collects more than 50 million pieces of data every day.
Then the question arises! The new way of industrial production will generate a huge amount of data, which belongs to the factory, the software manufacturer, the factory's customers or end users? And what new business models can be created using this data? This will be a key issue in determining the future of industrial competition.
Germany vs. the US; Daimler vs. Google
This issue is, to put it bluntly, a competition between "German manufacturing" and "US technology," and it also means a competition between two kinds of industrial perspectives. A very subtle and dramatic action is: Google, Apple, Amazon and many U.S. Internet companies "are attacking German industry", is a new industrial thinking and rules of the game into Germany's traditional industrial strengths, and the latter may even be reduced to its suppliers and affiliates.
This argument is not alarmist, just take Google as an example, in recent years, it bought a smart heating equipment business, turned into Bosch's competitors; in the diabetic contact lenses added to the measurement of blood glucose content in tears and the results of the transmission to the smartphone technology, into the medical field, Siemens is good at; and now, Google is also mucking around with the driverless car, and Daimler and BMW into peers.
(Above) Daimler teams up with BMW to launch two-seater electric car
Can "Industry 4.0" help German industry withstand such an onslaught? Kong Hanning, former chief executive of German software company SAP, said most German small and medium-sized enterprise owners do not realize a key issue, only the production of intelligent products is not enough, it is important to provide intelligent service capabilities, otherwise, Germany's current market-leading producers in the future may only be a service provider a replaceable product supplier.
Comment: "Industry 4.0" originated in Germany and flourished in the United States!
Two examples illustrate the point: Daimler has set up a dedicated R&D center in Silicon Valley to develop an in-vehicle smart entertainment system that will ultimately be controlled by Apple's Siri voice system; and German energy giants REWE and E.on have recently found themselves facing competition from a 5-year-old startup that will not be part of its 1,500-plus natural gas, solar and wind power generators. More than 1,500 natural gas, solar and wind power generators are connected through a network that allows the equipment to be switched on and off and adjusted on demand, creating a virtual power plant.
Whether it's an entertainment device in a car or a solar panel, whoever has access to the data and information attached to these intelligent products has the ability to provide intelligent services.
Comment: You are a producer, a service provider, or a user, and the subordinate order of these three determines the pattern of the future world! "Industry 4.0" is actually "Information 2.0" (the traditional Internet is Information 1.0). Let's look forward to history, if the historical process of human society is an exponential curve, today is the tipping point of the development of human society! New technologies such as big data, cloud computing, and the Internet of Things will bring about a series of miraculous changes! The future subversion is so terrible and so expected!
When Daimler meets Google, it is not only a competition between the superior industries of Germany and the United States, but also means that whoever can represent the most advanced productivity under the impetus of the mobile Internet will win the future!
In the end, I can't help but think of another question: where is China?
Mizuki Ran collated material from the Globe reporter