Industry 4.0 already has German enterprises to take the lead in 10 years or full promotion

The concept of "Industrial 4.0" was initially formed by the advice and impetus of German academia and industry, and was promoted to Germany's national strategy. Today, "Industry 4.0" has become popular all over the world, becoming a familiar hot word for investors.

"First financial daily" recently visited the hometown of Industrial 4.0-Germany, on-site visits to Bosch and other automotive plants, the industrial 4.0 have intuitive, perceptual understanding.

In an interview with this newspaper, the German Artificial Intelligence Research Institute CEO and Director of Science, the German Industry 4.0 Working Group Human Resources Chairman Wofgang Wallstedt (Wolfgangwahlster), in Germany, there are currently including Bosch companies have begun to try industrial 4.0 development model. He believes that over time, with the strong support of the German government, the Internet will be fully promoted in the next 10 years.

German companies have tried industrial 4.0

First Financial daily: German Industry 4.0 plan, how will the current industrial production of the impact?

Wallstedt: The main goal of Industry 4.0 is to achieve highly personalized product upgrades, which cost the same as the cost of large machine production, not very expensive. This means that big production can be done in a new way. We believe that more and more low-value-producing industries will be blended with high technology, and can use the same plant to produce more and more different products. In the past, especially in countries such as China, the production of standardized products through the traditional large-scale, of course, there is still a market. But now consumer demand is becoming more diverse and newer, which requires us to change our production methods.

Daily: Industry 4.0 is still in the blueprint and the pilot phase or has been widely used in German companies?

Wallstedt: From two aspects, first of all, if you are going to build a new factory, of course it is best to use the most advanced Industry 4.0 technology directly. There are already such factories in Germany. As far as we know, three such factories were built last year, which is based on the technical theory of Industrial 4.0.

Second, we can also be the existing production methods and systems for technical updates, and gradually transferred to the network system. There are some examples of this, for example, Bosch has a factory that continues to use its previous production techniques and models, while some have been completely updated to the Industry 4.0 network production model. Of course, these updates and changes take time to step up.

Every industrial revolution takes a certain amount of time to complete, and I believe it will take at least 10 years to complete such a transition in Germany. In the past year, only 5 factories have achieved the renewal and transformation of such technology and production methods.

Daily: Which industries are now in use?

Wallstedt: In the long run, smart factories will be promoted in many industries. But at present, the "tailoring" mode of production, that is, personalized production according to individual needs customization, in the automotive industry has been used for some time, but the amount is very small. BMW, for example, has about two cars a year in a "personalised" design. Another example is that the food industry is moving in this direction very quickly. For example, a plant that produces cereal products can get the ingredients you want on the Web first, and then produce the specific cereal you want based on your taste. There are similar examples in the luxury market. For example, you can make your own taste of perfume. At the same time, perfume packaging patterns can be personalized.

In traditional industries, packaging changes can be very difficult, but with 4.0 technology, in just a few minutes, the existing machines could be used to produce new packaging. In addition, in the long run, in the medical field, we have begun to carry out research in the field of medicine and pharmacy, once the cost reduction, can also be personalized use. We currently spend 500~1000 dollars to get the individual gene sequence of a patient, and then we can provide the drug according to the individual's genetic condition. This is personalized drug production.

Industry 4.0 promotion needs to be gradual

Daily: As a government strategic plan, the promotion of industrial 4.0 must have been strongly supported by the government. So what are the technical and financial obstacles now?

Wallstedt: For Germany, this is a huge wave, the government has a lot of support, we have many small and medium-sized enterprises are very active in the Industry 4.0 research and development. For the company, this is a huge investment, they receive a certain amount of subsidy and start-up funds from the government. Because it is a wave, so we have it technology Association, Electronic Engineering Association, and many companies and enterprises to work together. This is important because the transactions that are realized through the Internet need to cooperate with each other in order to make the dialogue between machines and machines possible. In Germany, employment relies on a high degree of industry and a solid foundation for manufacturing.

Daily: Realize industry 4.0 is there a timetable? When can we see the full application of this new manufacturing model?

Wallstedt: I think it will be 5-10 years in the future. In the next 10 years, Internet applications will be fully promoted in the industry, of course, this is a step-by-step process, because we have a large number of large enterprises transformation needs a lot of input. We need to find a suitable way and channel to help these large enterprises transform into another new mode of production.

Daily: How do you think about the Chinese market during the 4.0 promotion process? Do you have any cooperation with China?

Wallstedt: Of course, China is Germany's largest exporter of production technology, which is very important to us. In addition, there are a lot of Chinese companies are building new factories, which is a good opportunity to direct the use of Industrial 4.0 technology.

Now in China, there are some regions that want to build a manufacturing industry that has the opportunity to directly introduce state-of-the-art technology. I believe that this will be done.

(Responsible editor: Mengyishan)