CODESYS research projects
The CODESYS Group contributes to advancing automation technology.
Through our own research as well as active participation in public projects, we advance the technological progress of Germany as an industrial location. We use the knowledge gained in the development of innovative software products and thus create value for the entire automation industry. At the same time, we offer students attractive topics for their Bachelor and Master theses.
Software-defined Manufacturing Project SDM4ZI
Outline:
Funding program "Investments for the future of the Automotive Industry"
from the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Climate Action
Parties involved: 24 industrial partners, as well as the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology and the University of Stuttgart
In order to put factories in the position to better adapt to changing requirements, especially in the vehicle and supplier industry, production is to be defined purely by software, thus making it versatile - and all this with reduced effort and improved quality.
Based on digital models of products, production equipment, or production processes, each change generates new application software, tests, and documentation for controllers, which are then automatically tested in a virtual production against digital twins (incl. kinematics/dynamics). The application software generated in this way is processed on virtual controllers/PLCs in a datacenter, thus controlling real production. In order to support maintenance and optimization, key figures of the real and the virtual production are permanently compared. Administration is handled centrally across multiple locations and clouds, yet takes into account regional peculiarities.
The CODESYS Group develops the technological basis for the SDM4FZI Project, i.e., the central platform for the application software, as well as the virtual controllers and SoftPLC systems. Essential aspect of the research performance: Realization of virtual controllers and safety PLCs, controlling production from the datacenter in a freely scalable number and performance category. In addition, the integrated development environment (IDE) is provided on a public cloud platform so that it can be used for programming, central administration, and CI testing of virtual controllers across all locations. The results of the project will benefit all CODESYS customers looking to considerably simplify the administration of the overall system by reducing the hardware requirements of the automation platform via cloud or IT servers/datacenter.
More information and details on the funding program: https://www.sdm4fzi.de/en/.
