Background of the Standardization Council Industrie 4.0
The Beginnings
At the Hannover Messe 2016, the German industry announced the founding of the Standardization Council Industrie 4.0, an initiative originating from Bitkom, DIN, DKE/VDE, VDMA and ZVEI, with the aim of initiating standards for digital production and coordinating them nationally and internationally.
The SCI 4.0 takes over the coordination between industry and standardization, i.e. it mediates between the members of the Industrie 4.0 platform and the various standardization organizations (SDO).
The Goal
For the implementation of Industrie 4.0, standardization is of central importance. Industrie 4.0 requires an unprecedented integration of systems across domain and hierarchy boundaries and life cycle phases.
Close cooperation between research, industry and standardization is necessary to have a strong global presence and voice.
With RAMI 4.0, Germany is already providing a model which has a high reputation in the international standardization process and which serves as a catalyst for international cooperation by means of agile standardization.
In Practice
As digitalisation progresses, the ideas and form of production will change. The boundaries between industry and services will become even more permeable and global competition will henceforth be digitally driven in industry as well. Standardization plays an important role in this.
In order to keep up with the pace of development, agility must be taken into account in the standardization process.
It is our task to push ahead quickly with necessary standards and initiate their development in order to ensure interoperability between competing products and solutions, among other things.
The Standardization Initiative
Industrie 4.0 and the Standardization Council Industrie 4.0 operate together
The mission of the SCI 4.0 gets all the more importance and significance because it involves a network of standardization organizations that must work closely together to efficiently adress and close the technology gaps and needs identified by the industry.
The SCI 4.0 has an important, bundling function here. Ambitious but also feasible recommendations for action are to be developed for all actors, including the national and international initiation and coordination of suitable standards. In addition, an acceleration of the relevant standardization processes and a strengthening of the international competitiveness of Germany as an industrial location are to be developed.
The Process of orchestrating the Standardization
The whole process contains four steps and is structured into two phases. In the first phase, the project which is to be standardized is evaluated in terms of content with the relevant bodies and committees of the respective professional associations. The aim is to avoid overlaps in content in the Industrie 4.0 committee work during the consolidation phase. This ensures consistent coordination of topics for the results of work on international standardization from Germany, in order to subsequently initiate the standardization phase.
| Process step | Procedure | Your Involvment |
|
1. Initiate |
Initiation is done from an LNI4.0 Use Case or Testbed either with the aim of the transfer to a new specification/standard or to Revision of an existing specification/standard to fulfill the use case |
Entry of a Standardization project on the LNI4.0 Webpage |
|
2. Review and Decide |
A new standardization project is examined in detail by the SCI4.0 office together with the respective professional associations for relevance, chances of success and possible conflict of standards. In addition, possible target organizations and target bodies for the project are proposed with regard to a successful (international) implementation of the standardization project. |
Presentation of the standardization project to the expert committee of the professional associations |
| 3. Standardization (International) | Der genaue Prozess der Standardisierung ist abhängig von der gewählten Organisation und Publikationsform. Je nach Organisation kann ein Standard entweder als Konsortialstandard oder konsensbasierter Standard erstellt werden. Die Geschäftsstelle des SCI4.0 kann hierzu Hilfestellung z.B. bezüglich der Abläufe geben. | Implementation of the decided standardization project using the DKE Use Case Repository |
|
4. Validation |
Validation accompanying standardization is an agile process and, depending on the application, can either involve a new standardization project or revise an existing standard. | Practical validation of standardization work |
The Cooperation of SCI4.0 and LNI4.0
Standards are essential for the rapid implementation of Industry 4.0 solutions in practice. Through close cooperation of the Labs Network Industrie 4.0 e.V. association (LNI 4.0) and the Standardization Council Industrie 4.0, new Industie 4.0 solutions can be tested and validated from use cases and testbeds and the standards used within. The results are directly incorporated into the further development of standards both nationally and internationally via the SCI 4.0. The joint SCI 4.0 / LNI 4.0 process is designed to promote the close involvement of medium-sized companies in standardization work.
This concerted approach, which is unique in the world to date, contributes to strengthening the competitiveness of German companies in the Industrie 4.0 sector.
More than 300 application examples from German practise show that innovative processes that link plant engineering, IT systems and business models more closely together are already being developed and implemented by companies and research institutions. The collection continues to grow in the course of the cooperation with LNI 4.0.
The Initiators
The Bundesverband Informationswirtschaft, Telekommunikation und neue Medien e. V. (bitkom) is the industry association of the German Information and telecommunications industry.
The Deutsche Institut für Normung e. V. (DIN) is the most important national standards organization in the Federal Republic of Germany, a forum for the development of standards by consensus.
The DKE Deutsche Kommission Elektrotechnik Elektronik Informationstechnik im DIN und VDE is the organisation responsible within Germany for the development of standards, norms and safety regulations in the fields of electrical engineering, electronics and information technology.
The Labs Network Industry 4.0 (LNI 4.0) serves as a dialogue, competence and experimentation platform for German companies on the threshold of Industrie 4.0 and is an alliance of companies, associations, politics and researchers.
The Plattform Industrie 4.0 is a joint project of the German trade associations bitkom, VDMA and ZVEI for the further development and implementation of the Industrie 4.0 future project of the German government's high-tech strategy.
The Verband Deutscher Maschinen- und Anlagenbau (VDMA) with over 3200 member companies, is Europe's largest industry association and represents the interests of engineering companies worldwide.
The Zentralverband Elektrotechnik- und Elektronikindustrie e. V. (ZVEI) represents the economic, technological and environmental policy interests of the medium-sized German electrical industry.