ADI Awarded Contract to Develop Integrated Open Process Automation Testbed With Siemens at MxD

This first-of-its-kind, highly flexible testbed will showcase the advantages Open Process Automation, Digital Twin, and AI technologies can provide for manufacturers

October 28, 2024 (Global News Distribution) -

Applied Dynamics International (ADI) has been selected by MxD to lead the design and installation of an Integrated Open Process Automation (OPA) Testbed at the MxD factory floor in Chicago, Illinois. The project, scheduled to be completed in mid-2025, is a collaboration with MxD, Siemens, and the University of Michigan’s Barton Research Group. This first-of-its-kind, highly flexible testbed will showcase the advantages of open process automation and demonstrate the value that digital twin and machine learning technologies can provide for manufacturers.

“The proposed testbed represents a unique opportunity to push the boundaries of standard industrial manufacturing practices,” said Max Toothman, a Sr. AI Engineer at ADI and the principal investigator for the project. “This collaborative effort will combine a number of cutting-edge technologies into an interoperable system that can be used to test control and analysis methods from recent Industry 4.0 research.”

The vision for the Integrated OPA Testbed involves integrating two existing MxD testbeds, the Digital Twin Testbed for Process Manufacturing from Siemens and the Open Architecture Digital Twin Testbed, into a unified system that combines their individual strengths. Detailing compliance with the Open Process Automation Standard (O-PAS), this new testbed will utilize multiple control nodes to connect real-time edge computing capabilities, through ADI’s ADEPT platform, with state-of-the-art industrial control software, through Siemens’s SIMATIC PCS Neo platform. Local and cloud-hosted applications will allow researchers to deploy adaptive and extensible digital twins. With this digital twin technology, machine learning and artificial intelligence can be leveraged to enable process monitoring, anomaly detection, and predictive maintenance, among other capabilities.

ADEPT Plug-and-Play Industrial Computing and Connectivity Software Platform

ADEPT is an industrial edge computing and connectivity software platform built around the concept of time-deterministic “data frameworks” executing on Linux servers and operating as a single, coherent distributed resource controlled and managed via intuitive, drag-and-drop desktop tools. ADEPT is used in the largest, most demanding industrial computing and connectivity applications across the global aerospace and defense industry, but also scales down to work with low-cost computing hardware and open-source real-time Linux. The open architecture nature of ADEPT allows users to apply a modular open systems approach (MOSA) to real-time computing deployments and leverage best-in-class COTS and open-source technologies. ADEPT dramatically reduces the cost and time to deploy and operate industrial IoT and open process automation capability, providing comprehensive out-of-the-box capability built on a trusted technology platform. ADI’s ADEPT software platform can support advanced open real-time and virtual computing applications that require NIST 800-171 and CIS Security Level 2 compliance.

Siemens PCS neo

SIMATIC PCS neo is a state-of-the-art process control system designed to manage and automate industrial processes. This innovative system is designed to meet the evolving needs of the process industry, offering unparalleled flexibility, efficiency, and scalability. Unlike traditional systems, PCS neo is entirely web-based, allowing users to access and operate the system from any location using mobile devices or desktop computers. This feature ensures continuous and efficient operations, regardless of where team members are located. A key feature of SIMATIC PCS neo is its full support for the Module Type Package (MTP) standard, which allows for easier integration of plant modules, regardless of the manufacturer. This openness significantly reduces engineering efforts and enhances operational efficiency. Thus, from smaller systems to very large systems, SIMATIC PCS neo is suitable for industrial plants of all sizes.

Open Automation

The long-held practice of customizing process control using a single technology platform provided considerable benefits in previous decades. However, recent technology advances and expectations of present-day digital workers and consumers demand a shift to an open automation approach that allows hardware and software from multiple vendors to interoperate as a single, cohesive system. Seamless, intuitive incorporation of varied solutions into a common ecosystem addresses a substantial roadblock to implementing continuous improvement in process manufacturing. No longer locked into a single control platform, manufacturers will enjoy greater choice and be able to implement stepwise improvements continuously throughout the life of manufacturing assets and management systems. Open automation also benefits the broader manufacturing industry by promoting innovation and promoting competition.

Digital Twins

Digital twins are purpose-driven, dynamic, digital replicas of physical assets, processes, or products. While the benefits of digital twins are not yet fully realized in industry, research into digital twin technology is quickly developing and expanding in breadth and reach. Digital twins can be used in real time, using machine and process data to detect anomalies and predict failures before they occur. They can also be used in a virtual environment to test “what if” scenarios (without the risk of harm to people or damage to the facility) and generate insights that greatly improve quality, efficiency, and safety. When deployed on a wide scale, digital twins can provide organizations with the ability to quickly evaluate operations relative to market conditions and test assumptions for innovating and improving capabilities to improve their market position in the competitive global environment.