(
R)Evolution 4.0
Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult. Wolfgang Wahlster,
one of the world’s leading experts in artificial
intelligence, gives us a glimpse into the industrial processes of the future. In the world of
“
Industry 4.0”, machines will understand their environment and communicate with one
another using the Internet Protocol. The first factories of the new industrial evolution are set
to begin operation in just five years’ time.
Interview
trends in automation:
Prof. Wahlster, we often hear the term
“
Industry 4.0” being mentioned in expert discussions and
specialist media. In the future, machines will be able to com-
municate with one another and thus revolutionise conventional
industrial production. Are we actually heading towards a
fourth industrial revolution, as many commentators believe?
Prof. Wolfgang Wahlster:
Yes, cyber-physical production sys-
tems will revolutionise conventional manufacturing logic, as
the individual workpiece will work out itself which services
it requires from the plant. This entirely new architecture for
production systems can be implemented gradually through the
digital upgrading of existing production facilities, which means
that the concept can be realised not only in completely new
factories, but also rolled out step-by-step in existing factories
in an evolutionary process. In the current Industry 3.0, we are
already seeing signs of the imminent change from rigid central
industrial control to decentralised intelligence. Vast numbers
of sensors are recording their environment with incredible
precision and are making their own decisions in embedded
processor systems, independently of a central production
control system. The only things missing right now are compre-
hensive wireless networking of the components, the perma-
nent exchange of information, the merging of different sensor
evaluations for the identification of complex events and critical
states and their situation-dependent interpretation, as well as
further action planning based on these findings.
Why does industrial production need such a high degree of
networking of intelligent machines?
Wahlster:
In today’s factories, huge volumes of data are being
produced by an ever increasing number of measuring points.
These are handled easily by machines, but humans can no
longer process them at the same pace. It is therefore useful if
machines can communicate with one another in certain areas
of production. Many processes can be made more efficient,
flexible and cost-effective by creating instrumented environ-
ments. Extremely small, low-cost wireless sensors are
distributed throughout a production plant, allowing objects
to register their environment and communicate wirelessly.
Several different types of technical sensor, such as opto-
electrical sensors, pressure, temperature and infrared sensors,
work together to create an overall picture of the situation,
sensing what is currently going on in their environment.
In the world of Industry 4.0, products and production facilities
will become active system components, controlling their own
production and logistics. They will contain cyber-physical
systems that link the cyberspace of the Internet with the real
physical world. However, they are different from current
mechatronic systems as they have the ability to interact with
their environment, plan and adapt their own behaviour to
suit their environment and learn new behavioural patterns and
strategies and thus be self-optimising. They allow even the
smallest of batches with rapid product changes and a large
number of variants to be produced efficiently. Embedded
sensor/actuator components, machine-to-machine communi-
cation and active semantic product memories are giving rise
to new optimisation methods in order to conserve resources in
industrial environments. This will facilitate environmentally
About the person
Prof. Dr. Dr. h.c. mult.
Wolfgang Wahlster
The Doctor of Computer Science is a researcher and lec-
turer in the area of artificial intelligence at the Saarland
University. Wolfgang Wahlster is CEO and Technical and
Scientific Managing Director of the German Research
Center for Artificial Intelligence (DFKI) in Kaiserslautern,
Saarbrücken, Bremen and Berlin. As a member of the
Federal Government’s research alliance and Chairman
of the highest advisory body in the European Union on
the Internet of the future (FI-PPP programme), he advises
Europe’s political decision-makers. Prof. Dr. Wolfgang
Wahlster is one of the world’s leading experts in
the area of artificial intelligence. He is a winner of the
Federal President’s German Future Award for his
research work.
www.dfki.de