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At the end of month 24 of the EUPASS project, the activities related to the project's WP2 are now in the full modules development stage. An Opportune Work Package management structure has been worked out in order to ensure the maximum communication among developing partners, so that the data exchange needed for further definition of the modules themselves can take place with a maximum of efficiency and a minimum of overheads and delays. This activity also goes into a further refinement of the architectural concepts and in the further definition of the detailed architectural structure that has been outlined in the previous project phases. It also concurs into the detailed development of the structure of the "blueprint files", which interconnect the synthetic design environment with the system on-line control, being developed within the project’s WP3. Opportune contacts are being maintained with WP3 for this purpose.
An important development within WP2 is the set-up of the system's ontology and data model, as the WP2 ontology is going to affect the on-line control structures and the overall system behaviour as well, with fundamental windfalls on the overall project structure. The second draft of the Ontology has been distributed to partners in November 2006 and now the third and final version is currently under development.
In order to streamline the ontology development process, due to its paramount importance for the project as a whole, and to facilitate the development through the continuous exchange of data and information between the various stakeholders of the Ontology development and utilisation, an Ontology Review Committee has been established. This committee will actively supervise the ontology development and will ensure the constant data exchange and circulation at the various stages of the development process, thus ensuring that the development itself proceeds along a pathway that is well in line with stakeholders requirements and with the overall philosophy of the EUPAS system and architecture. The commission has been successfully established and is now at work, in parallel with the Ontology phase 3 development.
Within the context of the synthetic design environment’s module development process, particular importance has been acquired by the integration of the cost modelling assessment system into the general simulation and evaluation tool. The cost modelling development, in fact, has required the close interaction of two of WP2's major partners, and the detailed participation of the project's user partners, in order to ascertain which are the cost modalities and procedures that have to be used during the evaluation process. This evaluation has now reached completion, and the cost modelling system will be integrated into the simulation tool in the stated time.
All the project development activities related to the four fundamental modules of the synthetic design environment (requirements specification tool, microsystem design environment, simulation and evaluation tool, physical system configurator) are now tending towards the set-up of a demonstrational system for the 36th month of the project, in parallel with the development of the prototypal EUPASS cell. The structure of the demonstrator has been agreed and it will be based over the development and validation of an industrial test case, for a full preliminary evaluation of the functionality and of the performances of the synthetic design environment. The demonstrator should accommodate the final versions of the modules and save for the physical system configurator, which has envisioned by the WP2 work plan and will be available in this final form only later. So, the evaluation at month 36 will have a preliminary character, as the final system will be available only at the end of project. But the process of defining the evaluation and assessment procedures for both the M36 prototype and for the final system configuration are already in full course. |
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The latest Roadmap delivered by WP1 represents the long-term internal roadmapping effort. That is to say that it goes beyond a survey of the current EUPASS state-of-affairs in relation to global R&D and gives a portrait of what would need to be done should EUPASS go beyond its time span and into a 10-year period. Being an internal roadmap it does not take a neutral view on EUPASS strategies and will delve into a thorough analysis of future processes and alternative technologies only in relation to the specific EUPASS goals. This type of approach will be given in the forthcoming Global Technology Roadmap, to be published in June-July 2007. This Roadmap attempts to portray a complete view of the trends, opportunities and driving factors that may come to affect the outcome of EUPASS-related future technologies and implementations. Unlike most technology roadmaps, it does not focus solely on particular technologies, but strives to form a deeper and broader perspective on the global scenarios that may come to form our future possibilities, including political aspects and scientific paradigms. The application focus is on sustainability (an EC objective) and SMEs. The reason for taking a closer look at SME drivers is that according to the Observatory of European SMEs, 93% of all employees in Europe operate within companies with less than 10 employees, and over 120 million people are directly employed in the European SME sector (this value increases significantly if one adds the services around these SMEs). The broader perspective is given in terms of demographic, industrial, political and ecological aspects, illustrating facts that may induce even greater pressure on the automation needs of production. Typical examples include: - Europeans were 27% of the world population in 1900, but are now only 12%. By 2100, Europeans will represent only 7% of the global population. - Analyst IDC reported that the total value of the 100 largest European outsourcing deals signed in 2003 increased from $19bn to $44bn. - Manufacturing is the key to exploiting the new knowledge economy - over 80% of EU private sector R&D expenditures are spent in manufacturing. - A recent EC major study concludes that, on average, the profitability of the European venture capital industries is not meeting the risk-adjusted return requirements of the institutional investors. - Production is rapidly moving towards highly complex scenarios in which marketing, society, business, technology, ecology and other factors all have to be simultaneously considered in order to succeed in the long-term. At present, there seems to be a lack of understanding of this fact, and a reluctance to realise that most of our knowledge needs to be re-defined and re-structured to cope with such scenarios. - If legislation demands major economic efforts from producers, all the while not restricting imports of a similar nature from non-EU, non-regulated nations, the competition is totally unfair.
The roadmap then proceeds to illustrate some of the emerging products, markets, and the available technologies for assisting the launch and support of such technology. The characteristics of most of the emerging products do not differ greatly from those of the telecom industry, where customer-tailored variants with ever-increasing functionality are becoming a necessity. As an example, the roadmap points out that with a market estimated at US$6 billion, the pharmaceutical & medical sector is standing out, with new product categories that may include: |
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- Medical devices that monitor hormone levels on a real-time basis AND dispense adequate medication continuously. - Smart connectors that enable either multiple device connection OR enable connectors to monitor certain maintenance aspects. - Smart test tubes and other collecting devices that reduce paperwork and self-monitor. Other potential areas of interest include: - "Target-killers": micro-machines that attack only cancer/diseased cells. - Stem-cell manufacturing plants: extremely clean room assembly cells for the construction of human tissue and/or specific cells. - Multi-variant pill production: high volume production of common drugs in a variety of brands, packaging, and dosage ranges.
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After a survey of existing assembly systems and control solutions, the roadmap details some of the technologies and approaches that still need to be emphasized in Europe and, possibly, EUPASS. The needs and opportunities, for European manufacturers on a global market, may be summed up as: - Reduce implementation costs (rapid deployability) - Reduce integration costs (rapid deployability) - Minimise re-engineering - Enhance autonomy, plugability, modularity (rapid deployability) - Improve uptime & yield (better error recovery & diagnosis) - Improve man-machine interactions (ergonomics) - Improve data & information flow to all levels of supply chain - Robust processes - Apply easy-to-use technology - Systems with rapid responses to dynamic events
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Needless to re-affirm, EUPASS seems to be working in the correct direction, and its initial goals and ambitions fulfil most of these opportunities. In particular, EUPASS efforts in the following fields are essential: - global standards for the interfaces should be applied to as great an extent as possible, or developed. - the solutions to date provide attempts at short reconfiguration time from a mechanical point of view, but to achieve truly fast production changeovers, more focus should be given to the control aspects (due to the needs posed by rapid deployment). - finalising the set-up of the assembly systems underlines the importance of information aspects (configuration & control), since configuration & control lie at the heart of emergence (poor process knowledge = failure). - each system module should provide a description of its skills in computer understandable format; this would allow faster module selection for the user needs and simultaneously provide vital information for the configuration of the assembly system.
In conclusion, one may state that the project does have the necessary vision and work is being done in the given directions (rapid deployability, evolvability, plugability), but this must become a global EUPASS belief. As defined by the latest string of project meetings, the objectives defined by the roadmap are well in accordance to the goals set for the forthcoming demonstration platform (PV2), and potential breakthroughs could well be expected. The Global Technology Roadmap due this summer will delve even further, and form a more detailed picture of what global markets and broader scenarios may hold in store. Until then, EUPASS may be viewed as upholding its promise at targeting future opportunities.
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