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In a workshop of Chengdu Rock Precision Manufacturing Co. Ltd. (Chengdu Rock), the machines are running smoothly and orderly even there are only a few workers moving around. The constantly changing figures on the screens are telling the stories about the operation conditions, continuous work hours and production task loads of the machines...This is a smart manufacturing line. CASICloud, a subsidiary of China Aerospace Science and Industry Corporation Limited (CASIC), spends 6 months customizing this line specially for Chengdu Rock, of which the real-time data on equipment operation, production management and so on are transmitted to CASICloud platform.
Based on the data uploaded, CASICloud further matches Chengdu Rock with possible partners, so that the production capacity of the company can be optimized according to the market demands to the greatest extend. Besides the technical support and equipment, CASICloud also helps Chengdu Rock solving financial problems with financial lease.
The same thing happens to Jiangsu Changzhou Mould Manufacturing Co., Ltd. and other medium and small enterprises in every industry of the country. They are bound together by a “net” named CASICloud.
Find a Way of Developing the Industrial Internet with Chinese Characteristics
Since the beginning of the reform and opening-up, China has seen the sustained and rapid development of manufacturing industry in the past 40 years. Nowadays, the manufacturing scale of the fully developed industry system in China is leading the world. However, as the excess capacity is becoming a universal problem, the manufacturing industry of China, who relies on the resources and labor forces very much, is now under tremendous pressure. The transformation and upgrading is extremely urgent.
A new technical and industrial revolution is now prevailing all around the world. With the comprehensive effect of massive technical breakthroughs and essential institutional innovations, the manufacturing industry is developing by leaps and bounds instead of going forward step by step. Currently, it is accepted worldwide that “industrial Internet is the new drive of manufacturing industry and economic development”. The application of new information technologies, for example, cloud computing, in manufacturing industry is expected to bring the industry bright prospect in fundamental transformation.
To build and develop the industrial Internet is an important part of the establishment of modern economic system in our country. It is also a necessary condition to promote the advanced manufacturing industry and to create new advantages of industrial development. The industrial Internet will definitely take the lead in the new stage of reform and opening-up.
What is the best solution for industrial Internet development in China? Is the newly shaped “German mode” or “American mode” a proper reference?
As Mr. Gao Hongwei, the Secretary of Party Leadership Group and Chairman of CASIC says, most enterprises in our country are not capable of smart manufacturing yet, and the operational processes of such enterprises are not fully informationized either. Therefore, considering the intelligent and informational renovation will not be completed in a short time, the revolution will firstly take place in the production mode of cloud manufacturing. With the intelligent renovation of manufacturing capacity and the informational reconstruction of operational processes heading forward in a gradual manner, the institutional adjustment and modification will be implemented in the enterprises at the same time. The final objective is to initiate collaborative manufacturing on the basis of cloud manufacturing, and further to upgrade to smart manufacturing. “Gradually deepening from top to bottom”, this is how China will build an industrial Internet stamped with its own characteristics.
Early in 2009, Academician Li Bohu of CASIC was the first one in the world presenting the concept of “cloud manufacturing”. In recent years, CASIC insisted on practicing the mode of “Internet + smart manufacturing” by setting up COSIM, aerospace material website and aerospace industry website.
On June 15, 2015, after years of hard work, CASIC brought the first industrial Internet public service platform in China—CASICloud into being. Covering the entire process and all elements of the industrial chain, CASICloud provided a complete system of products and services based on the concept of “Internet + smart manufacturing”.
On June 15, 2017, CASIC presented to the world an industrial Internet public service platform based on INDICS (industrial intelligent cloud system), with proprietary intellectual property right. It is the very first one in China and also a pioneer in the world. One year later, on June 15, 2018, Cloud Manufacturing Support System (CMSS) developed from INDICS was officially released. After that, CASICloud clarified the essential position of INDICS+CMSS and built up a model of cloud manufacturing industry cluster ecosystem.
For the 3 years past, CASICloud took great effort to explore the approach of developing industrial Internet with Chinese characteristics. It was constructing and cultivating the ecosystem of cloud manufacturing industry cluster with industrial Internet as basis. It contributed a lot to the revolution of production mode and the transformation of manufacturing industry.
“As an industrial Internet public service platform, CASICloud delivered fruitful results in the past 3 years and preliminarily proved the feasibility of industrial Internet with Chinese characteristics.” said Gao Hongwei.
According to statistics, up to December 3, over 2,680,000 enterprises from 202 countries and regions all over the world have registered in CASICloud. These enterprises have released collaboration and procurement demands of CNY 576.3 billion and the price of transactions made on the platform is over CNY 300 billion. The price of the overseas demands released on INDICS international cloud platform is over USD 5.1 billion and that of the settled international transactions is up to USD 1 billion. There have been 920,000 machines registered on the cloud platform, and 360,000 of them are currently available.
As more market sources gather on the cloud, supported by CASICloud, CASIC makes the first step in “cloud marketing”. By motivating all employees of the enterprises and all people of the society to participate in marketing, “cloud marketing” is expected to become an effective approach of changing the economic growth pattern and adjusting the industrial structure as new market demand and the drive of development can be created thereby.
Define the Innovative Essence Leading the Industrial Internet Development
CASIC’s original purpose in developing industrial Internet with Chinese characteristics is to promote the transformation and upgrading of Chinese manufacturing industry. CASIC holds its leading position in what it pursues with its constant innovations.
Industrial Internet virtualizes the suppliers’ resources and puts the resources into the “cloud pool”, while the buyers dig out such resources and procure all necessary services including design, customized production and after-sales maintenance.
The “cloud pool” is the platform of industrial Internet. It is not only the essence of the industrial Internet, but also the critical part of constructing the new business environment for manufacturing industry. It is called the “operation system” of new industrial system. Equipment, software, workshops, products and labor forces are all included in the cloud pool for acquisition, integration, analysis and services of massive industrial data, so that the general communication, flexible supply and effective allocation of industrial resources can be achieved. It is the key to develop advanced, digital, intelligent, network and cloud based manufacturing industry.
“As Android system is to cellphones, INDICS is going to be a universal industry-oriented cloud platform.” says a specialist of CASIC.
With two years of investigations, visits to users and practices after CASICloud is officially released, INDICS, the cloud platform providing public services for smart manufacturing, collaborative manufacturing and cloud manufacturing in our country, is developed through continuous optimization of platform functions and application scenarios.
Technically, INDICS is on the same level as the mainstream industrial Internet platforms internationally recognized, but it does possess more platform functions and application scenarios. Thanks to its outstanding expertise, INDICS provides various enterprises with popular free services and individualized value-added services. Besides Chinese, the international version of INDICS cloud platform supports 7 other languages, which makes it possible for INDICS to help the other countries and regions in the world with industrial Internet-related issues.
In 2017, witnessed by Chairman Xi Jinping of China and Chancellor Merkel of Germany, CASIC and Siemens AG signed an strategic cooperation agreement, showing their desires for collaboration in industrial Internet and smart manufacturing. The alliance of two strength was aimed at shaping the new industrial ecosystem of the future.
In 2018, the core architecture of “industrial Internet space + cloud manufacturing support system” was finalized for CASICloud which already had over 2.60 million users, and CMSS derived from INDICS was also released.
As the platform foundation and architecture are continuously optimized and the number of users is increasing, CASICloud enters a market-oriented developing stage, where the application becomes the major drive and the user’s experience is taken as the primary criteria for work result assessment.
A specialist of CASICloud says, “The establishment and development of industrial Internet platform is a process of iterative optimization and constant upgrading. Constant innovations based on both supplies and the demands are the essence and focus of CASICloud.
Driven by the original intention of serving the users, the platform design team identifies the users’ “shortcomings” through in-depth visits, so as to make the function and interface designs attractive to the users and further to make the enterprises become the users by their own choice.
On the 20th China International Industry Fair, INDICS+CMSS won the gold metal.
Cultivate Ecological System of Industrial Internet
Development of industrial Internet is significant to the establishment and cultivation of business environment and ecosystem. Sound business environment and favorable ecological system will provide the tree of industrial Internet with pleasant soil to grow up in.
CASICloud is now devoting itself to building and shaping the cloud manufacturing industry cluster ecosystem based on the industrial Internet. Composed by the application supplier, user and operator, there comes the CMSS ecological system where the three parties provide each other with benefits and also share the good results. The new opening and sharing ecosystem to be built could provide a complete set of stable and reliable solutions for digitized transformation of any enterprise and for the cloud-oriented reconstruction of the industry.
CMSS includes four complete-flow service support systems respectively specialized in industrial product marketing and procurement, manufacturing capacity and productive service outsourcing, collaborative manufacturing among enterprises and smart manufacturing at project level and enterprise level. Excellent services are provided to the users through the business interfaces of “One Brain, One Cab, Two Rooms and Two Stations”. Enterprise brain works for decision making of enterprises based on scientific truth. Enterprise cab pilots the business management of enterprises. Cloud business work room gives support to massive production, supply and sales business and other related businesses, while cloud application work room does the same for customization, design, research & development, test and after-sales technical services. By providing specialized services and functions, the combination of on-line enterprise cloud service station and off-line small & micro businesses service station makes it possible for enterprises of different types and scales to join the cloud manufacturing industrial cluster.
Mr. Gao Hongwei points out that, due to the complexity of industrial scenarios and the diversities of professional skills and knowledge, a universal application would never be enough for the specific digital engineering demands of the countless manufacturing enterprises. For this reason, a complete flow of integral deployment procedure and technical support has been built by CASICloud. Additionally, third party APPs have also been attracted by the platform recourses and introduced in through business cooperation. All these are for the purpose of providing flexible and customized solutions for the user’s application scenarios.
General Manager Chai Xudong of CASICloud says, “CASICloud is the test field where a great amount of homemade industrial application software can be developed, upgraded and improved.”
Meanwhile, CASICloud is also a club full of application and software developers, service providers, industrial users and platform operators, where everyone shares the resources. The variety and scope of CMSS application services are expanded thereby and solid foundation of cloud manufacturing is made.
“Changzhou mode” is a successful practice of industrial Internet development. Since the industrial Internet development in Changzhou City was greatly promoted in 2017, 84.9% of the enterprises above the designated scale have signed in on the platform of CASICloud. In this way, the city presents its available resources of manufacturing enterprises as a whole to the market to appeal to external orders. Besides, the production efficiency and the balanced equipment utilization can be improved accordingly. At the same time, a great number of enterprises gather around the industrial Internet, such as on-line and off-line service providers, collaborative operators, solution suppliers and industrial APP suppliers. An industrial Internet environment of Changzhou style has been established thereby.
In the future, CASIC will closely pursue the new tendency of world and strive for the leading position in development. By building up and cultivating the cloud manufacturing industrial cluster on the basis of industrial Internet, CASIC will bring new drive to the transformation and upgrading of Chinese manufacturing industry and provide the economic development of China with new strength. (Reported by Ke Xuan)
