Siemens Automation Summit Showed Real Progress Toward Digital Enterprise

Siemens held its Automation Summit Users Conference in Boca Raton, Florida June 26-29th 2017. More than 800 end users, OEMs, system integrators, distributors, and media attended the event. Themes of digitalization, digital twin, digital enterprise, and disruptive technology were heard throughout the event, with MindSphere, Siemens' cloud-based, open operating system for IIoT as the common thread. Attendees had their choice of about 75 sessions given by Siemens' customers, system integrators, and employees; with many sessions being real-world case studies categorized by: productivity and efficiency, maintenance and operations, safety and industrial security, best practices and novel approaches, digitalization, and future roadmap. In addition, there were about 16 hands-on training sessions, as well as a “technology café” that served as a product and solutions showcase for Siemens and its partners.

Investing in the Digital Enterprise
Raj Batra, President, Siemens USA, Digital Factory Division, kicked off the event. Mr. Batra explained that the company’s investments in the digital enterprise include $10 billion in software and automation acquisitions since 2007, $5 billion in annual R&D expenditures, 32,000 R&D employees, and 17,500 software engineers. Major acquisitions included UGS (now Siemens PLM), which established Siemens as a leader in the PLM space; LMS for 3D simulation; and the recent acquisition of Mentor Graphics, which brings technologies, such as electronic design automation (EDA) software and embedded devices, to the company's broad solutions portfolio. Siemens digital enterprise leverages Industrie 4.0 for IIoT, along with industrial solutions for software, automation, communication, security, and services for the full range of discrete and process industries. It also fully embraces Siemens’ Teamcenter, a suite of PLM computer software applications that help create digital twins across the entire value chain, including product design, production planning, engineering, and execution, as well as a full range of services.

MindSphere, a Scalable Cloud Platform as a Service
The Automation Summit provided ample opportunities for attendees to learn about Siemens’ MindSphere scalable cloud platform as a service (PaaS) that developers can use to develop and deploy applications. The solution includes digital services with data analytics and connectivity capabilities, plus a variety of tools for developers. The MindSphere cloud platform is designed to help manufacturers improve the efficiency of plants by recording and analyzing large volumes of production data, and providing a foundation for applications and data-based services from Siemens and third-party providers. Potential application areas include predictive maintenance, energy data management, and resource optimization. The solution also offers customers a development environment in which they can integrate with their own applications and services. Siemens demonstrated to attendees how to connect, configure and run the MindSphere services, and cited the growing ecosystem of partners and developers, such as PWC, Accenture, Tata, SAP, and Atos. Much was also written about MindSphere from Siemens recent Innovation Day.

You can’t discuss IIoT or the digital enterprise without also addressing cybersecurity, often the biggest obstacle that companies face when considering IIoT, remote services, data analytics, etc. Cloud-based technologies require protection of the plant and cybersecurity expertise in standards such as ISA/ISO, NIST, and NERC-CIP. In response, Siemens used the Automation Summit to address cybersecurity head-on and discuss how the company aligned with NIST and IEC Standards 62443 to devise cybersecurity solutions for its portfolio and countermeasures to potential vulnerabilities.

Product Roadmaps and Breakout Sessions
The Automation Summit also featured product roadmaps sessions. One that received a lot of attention was on Siemens’ simulation platform, SIMIT, which is tightly integrated to SIMATIC PLCs, PCS 7 distributed control systems, safety systems, and its TIA Portal for project simulation, testing and operator training. Scalable offerings based on the SIMIT simulation products range from engineering, factory acceptance testing, and virtual commissioning to high-fidelity process simulations used to train process operators. SIMIT was featured in a case study presentation by SBM Offshore, a provider of floating production units. The company utilized SIMIT for system testing and management of its integrated control and safety system consisting of PCS 7 and PCS 7 failsafe technologies, as well as an ISA 18.2-based alarm management system.

In breakout sessions, we learned how Siemens partners apply the company’s solutions along with their own.

DMC, a Siemens solutions partner, demonstrated WinCC OA's open library. This contains many common industrial objects for fast HMI/SCADA development, using modular, reusable, and object-oriented code. (In another session, DMC demonstrated moving S7-1200 PLC data to the cloud via standard MQTT protocol as a quick, less expensive path to connect machines to IIoT and Industrie 4.0.)

Secure-NOK, also a partner, demonstrated how it uses TIA Portal to fight cyberattacks in PLCs by injecting worms to monitor and fight back. Secure-NOK developed and tested a cyber-attack detection solution for PLC that addresses both brownfield and greenfield deployments and for which the brownfield deployment doesn’t require any changes to the PLCs.

Another partner, Bluvision, demonstrated how it implemented condition monitoring at a major soft drink producer, using vibration data from Bluvision beacons and MindSphere to perform condition-based maintenance on over 200 small motors in a bottling line.

MindSphere Partners Presenting Solutions
Some key MindSphere partners also presented solutions.

Bentley Systems’ partnership integrates its OpenPlant 3D modeling software with Siemens COMOS 2D process and system engineering software to model and digitize brownfields. A new proof of concept was presented demonstrating the MindSphere IoT Platform with Bentley’s digital engineering and analytics tools to deliver solutions for operations and maintenance in a brownfield plant.

Another key partner, Atos, presented some of its applications based on MindSphere, such as for industrial digital services, including chemical as a service, digital twin, PLM, and Industrie 4.0.

A number of Siemens customers presented case studies.
Allnex, a specialty chemical company, had system integrator AESolutions deploy Siemens Virtualization as a Service, or SiVaaS, and a hypervisor as part of an upgrade to Allnex’s 10-year old PCS7 DCS and Siemens batch software. This enabled Allnex to take advantage of all the benefits of virtualization, such as fewer servers to maintain.

Another chemical industry example was DuPont, which, along with system integrator RoviSys, did a PCS7 DCS migration and FEED project for DuPont’s Tedlar industrial film manufacturing plant, replacing legacy DCS, PLCs, and I/O without interrupting production. The FEED study identified a migration concept and created a cost estimation that was key in obtaining funding. Another chemical company, USALCO, also highlighted migration projects.

Tenaris, a pipe manufacturer, deployed the world’s largest Siemens TIA Portal installation at its first greenfield project in the US, a $1.8 billion seamless pipe manufacturing facility. Tenaris collaborated with Siemens through the entire project lifecycle, including design, purchasing, implementation, commissioning, and operations. Key solutions delivered with the project included integrated safety, mobile safety, and the S7-1500 PLC.

Conclusion
In summary, Siemens Automation Summit Users Conference clearly demonstrated how the company is evolving its product and solutions portfolio towards a digital enterprise and IIoT, all based on its MindSphere platform. ARC sees the ecosystem for MindSphere growing rapidly, with added partners and developers creating apps that will leverage the platform and increase implementations.

As more companies adopt a digitalization strategy, more real-world case studies of the digital enterprise will be documented and presented. This, in turn, should lead to further implementations across all industries and geographies. Long term, it will be impossible for manufacturing companies to compete if they do not implement and become a digital enterprise.

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Keywords: Automation Summit, MindSphere, Digital Twin, Digital Enterprise, IIoT, ARC Advisory Group.