The digital factory not far behind

PUNE, INDIA: We are still not there to witnessing a factory where the erstwhile physical mortar and the digital cubicle are not compartmentalized but rather enable a smooth relay or better still, work in tandem.

But engineering majors like Siemens feel that the gap is being worked on seriously and would fill in for sure.

As Narendar Reddy, MD, India, Siemens PLM Software Operations observes in response to the distance between the physical and virtual manufacturing, "There is a lot of progress done already and manufacturing has been digitized to a great extent. But yes, integration in some areas is still missing.”

“This is significant as most companies are going increasingly global with dispersed geographical and manufacturing footprint thus requiring high levels of integration. Our vision is integrating the product cycle in view of these demands and collaboration components play a major impact here,”

According to him, “Various manufacturing components need to enable a faster feeding back of shop floor data into the digital counterparts and vice versa. We are working on such solutions for the future."

Incidentally, Siemens, the German industrial giant with a diversified presence across medical, transport and telecom industries, acquired the digital major and PLM software company UGS last year.

The acquisition was seen as a bridge between how products are designed in engineering and how they are manufactured on the shop floor. Post this, the Siemens Automation and Drives (A&D) Group used UGS' PLM and CAD software as a natural extension to its own industrial automation products.

UGS, too, had started inching towards the manufacturing end with the Tecnomatix acquisition in 2005 that added to its CAD/CAM and collaborative product management tools.

This was a software used to digitally build and simulate manufacturing lines.

Now, Siemens has just released Solid Edge with Synchronous Technology software, a CAD modeling system, which Reddy admits is a major upshot of the IP integration of both the companies.