In the digital age, cloud computing has penetrated into the development context of all walks of life. As the pillar of the national economy, the manufacturing industry has accelerated the pace of transformation and upgrading to automation, intelligence and digitization. The emergence of industrial cloud has broken the basic technical capabilities and information barriers between traditional industrial enterprises, spawned a new industrial production model and activated the new driving force of industrial economy.
According to IDC data, the compound annual growth rate of China’s industrial market scale is expected to reach 35.4% from 2020 to 2025. Some research institutions commented that the industrial cloud market continues to be driven by the endogenous demand of enterprises, superimposed with policy catalysis, and its development is expected to accelerate in the future. Especially since entering the era of industry 4.0, the wave of intelligent manufacturing will further intensify the collision and integration between cloud computing and industrial production, and an unprecedented industrial cloud “change” is slowly opening.
Increase efficiency of equipment
The sheet metal stamping workshop in Hangzhou Robam Appliances Co.Ltd(002508) Sanbu Maoshan base is equipped with 284 sets of automatic equipment, covering an area of 50000 square meters, but there is no worker in the factory, only the roar of machine operation. From a village run enterprise in Luosiqiao village, Linping, Hangzhou to one of the first batch of 12 “future factories” assessed by the Department of economy and information technology of Zhejiang Province, Hangzhou Robam Appliances Co.Ltd(002508) has become a benchmark of local intelligent manufacturing.
It is understood that the reason why these 284 devices can realize automatic operation is inseparable from the ” Hangzhou Robam Appliances Co.Ltd(002508) nine day central digital platform” built by Alibaba cloud IOT industrial Internet platform. All equipment in the factory are connected to the platform, and the real-time data generated by tens of thousands of points are gathered together after processing and intelligent analysis to form a “brain” that can command the whole process scheduling of the whole factory, which helps the factory realize the independent coordinated operation and flexible response between different equipment. The data acquisition of the equipment has been improved from “second level” to “millisecond level”, the stability has been improved to 100%, the overall production efficiency of the factory has been improved by 45%, and the production cost has been reduced by 21%. This is the power of the cloud on the equipmentp align=”center”>
The so-called equipment on the cloud is to connect complex industrial equipment with each other through cloud computing for scientific, centralized and data-based management, so as to achieve the role of cost reduction and efficiency, energy conservation and carbon reduction. According to the data of the Ministry of industry and information technology, the number of industrial equipment connected to the industrial Internet has reached 73 million sets, and the number of industrial apps has exceeded 590000.
It’s not easy to cloud such a large-scale device. Zhang Chao, assistant researcher of the industrial Internet Research Office of the Institute of information and software of CCID think tank, said that the lack of consensus on the strategic idea of cloud, the difficulty of industrial data collection, the high difficulty of large-scale interconnection, and the immature data analysis and processing model are the problems that need to be solved urgently in the current device cloud. He believes that “equipment on the cloud” is a system engineering involving multiple forces at the network layer, platform layer and application layer. In order to improve the coverage of “equipment on the cloud”, upstream network support, midstream software services and downstream equipment applications need to work together.
industrial simulation: quietly approaching
Simulation technology is essential in industrial production. The emergence of industrial cloud makes it possible for Beijing Vastdata Technology Co.Ltd(603138) analysis, fast computing and storage generated in the simulation process. “Cloud + simulation” has greatly improved the collaborative production efficiency of manufacturing enterprises. For example, before R & D and production of an automobile, it is necessary to simulate and analyze the whole vehicle, stamping forming, casting and forging process through simulation software, optimize the structural design and eliminate potential safety hazards. For another example, the design and manufacture of spacecraft need to use virtual prototype technology to improve the efficiency of spacecraft collaborative design, find the problems in the design in advance, reduce the R & D cost and shorten the R & D time.
It is understood that simulation technology can be applied to the whole life cycle of manufacturing, including design, production, testing, maintenance, service and other links. It plays an important role in improving the efficiency of product development, strengthening the ability of data collection, analysis and processing, and reducing decision-making errors. However, because most simulation software is expensive, the technical threshold is high, the technical maturity needs to be improved, and most enterprises lack talents who are familiar with simulation technology and have manufacturing expertise, the overall implementation of simulation technology in the industrial field is not ideal.
Zhang Lin, President of the simulation technology industry branch of China Industrial Cooperation Association and professor of Beijing University of Aeronautics and Astronautics, pointed out in an interview with the reporter of China Electronics News: “most Chinese enterprises only carry out local simulation at some points, but in the depth of application, they stay on the surface more, and few really use simulation to promote core business.”
However, it is gratifying that in the past two years, the state has vigorously promoted the development of industrial software, and various national and industrial standards on simulation have developed rapidly, creating conditions for the application and promotion of simulation software. Zhang Lin said: “more and more enterprises realize that the transformation of enterprises urgently needs to improve the ability of innovative design, and simulation technology is the core of innovative design. Now, with the simulation technology entering a new development climax, the explosion point of industrial simulation also follows.”
The core driving force for the development of industrial simulation lies in the needs of enterprises. Only when enterprises truly realize the value of simulation, supplemented by the support of external forces, can they really promote the application and development of simulation technology. Zhang Lin suggested that, on the one hand, the national level needs to increase policy support and investment to encourage the research and development of industrial simulation software; On the other hand, we should speed up the formulation of industrial simulation related standards to standardize and guide all kinds of simulation activities. In addition, it is necessary to speed up the training of interdisciplinary talents in industry and simulation.
cloud security issues: the biggest obstacle
As a “famous weaving city in China”, Lanxi City, Zhejiang Province has made great efforts to “replace people with machines” in the past two years. It is reported that the local textile industry enterprises in nine digital transformation pilot, introduced 25000 global advanced looms, launched an accurate digital “make-up class”. The data shows that after 98% of the production equipment data of the nine pilot enterprises in Lanxi were connected, the average consumption of water, electricity and steam per 10000 meters of cloth decreased by 9.8%, 1.6% and 5.6% respectively, the error rate decreased from 2.4% to 1%, and the benefit increased by 12.3% on average. Subsequently, more than 40 textile enterprises began to contact digital transformation in various ways, and the output value reached more than half of Lanxi textile industry.
The primary problem faced by these textile enterprises when they go to the cloud is security Dbappsecurity Co.Ltd(688023) actively participated in the industrial Internet digital transformation project of Lanxi textile industry, and provided a number of local enterprises with full scene security products and services through industrial Internet platform, industrial app, industrial big data and industrial control system, so that they can truly “dare to go to the cloud” and “dare to use the cloud” Dbappsecurity Co.Ltd(688023) also won the “Application Award” in the 2021 China Industrial Internet security competition with this case.
“In the service process, we found that many enterprises still have doubts about the industrial cloud, and most of them are in the wait-and-see stage.
”Ye Peng, Dbappsecurity Co.Ltd(688023) vice president and general manager of industrial Internet Security Division, told China Electronics News, “industrial enterprises belong to traditional industries, and stability and security are their first goals. Therefore, they are relatively cautious about the choice of new technologies. Putting core data on the cloud will make them feel uneasy, which is also one of the main reasons that hinder industrial enterprises from going to the cloud.”
Although the cloud is the general trend, the potential security problems can not be ignored. For example, the cloud on the device will cause a large number of devices to be directly exposed to network attacks, and the Trojan virus can spread between these exposed devices at an exponential rate of infection. For another example, under the unmanned production mode, the factory network is rapidly developing in the direction of three modernizations (IP, flat and wireless) + flexible networking (5g + MEC or 4G + 5g + MEC, etc.). This complex network architecture leads to the decline of the traditional protection effect based on static protection strategy and security domain. In addition, under the increasingly severe new situation of network security, industrial control systems, industrial Internet platforms and industrial applications are also facing new security challenges.
Ye Peng pointed out that from a policy point of view, we need strong support from the state to promote model enterprises to go to the cloud first and play an exemplary role, so as to drive the industry to go to the cloud; From a technical point of view, we should iterate the technology according to the pain points of the enterprise and make more efforts to solve the problems of stability and security.
future development: grasp two key points
“The slow development of industrial cloud is largely due to the fact that many industrial enterprises have not completed the digitization process and do not have the sufficiency and necessity to go to the cloud.” Wang Yunhou, senior analyst of Baidu intelligent cloud, told the China electronic newspaper reporter that “the enterprises are not clear or worried about the effect of the cloud, or the data resources of enterprises are few or no development value. They may also be unable to adapt to the system after the cloud is in the organizational structure and management mode. The difficulties and bottlenecks on the cloud are not in the technical links, but in whether the enterprises can realize the realization of data value through the cloud.”
However, Ye Peng said that the development path of industrial cloud is the same as that of other new technologies in industry. For example, Ethernet technology has not been optimistic in the industrial field, but with the development of technology, more than 90% of industrial networks have adopted Industrial Ethernet technology. The same is true of cloud computing. Leading ia manufacturers such as GE, abb and Siemens are laying out industrial cloud technology and virtualization technology. Industrial cloud will be widely recognized in the next 5-10 years.
At present, cloud on equipment, industrial simulation and industrial cloud security have become important driving points for the development of industrial cloud. According to Wang yunhou’s analysis, the cloud on the device is the easiest, and getting through the data is the key; The core weakness of industrial simulation lies in computing power and data security; Industrial cloud security related technologies still have room for improvement and great potential.
He said: “the outbreak of industrial cloud market will have two key nodes: one is that small and medium-sized enterprises begin large-scale digital transformation (mainly large enterprises at present), and the other is that a large number of OEM enterprises turn to building their own brands (release a large number of R & D marketing cloud demand). In terms of policy, we should encourage cloud to encourage applications (IAAs to SaaS) ； Industry cloud should focus on building common knowledge platform; Enterprises should first sort out the business transformation ideas, and then clarify the cloud path map; From the technical level, low code may become the fuse to detonate the industrial cloud market. “
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