EMO Hannover 2019 will position new business models based on intelligent networking
The EMO Hannover 2019, the world’s premier trade fair for the metalworking industry, will be held from September 16 to 21 under the motto of ‘Smart Technologies Driving Tomorrow’s Production’. It will thus be concentrating on the current paradigm shift in industrial production operations, which are no longer focusing only on “better, faster, more accurate”, but on the development and implementation of new functions within the framework of Industry 4.0. Digitalization and intelligent networking in conjunction with numerous new developments, from big data, data analytics and artificial intelligence, all the way through to the platform economy, create the foundations for new business models, so that customers and vendors can reach a new level of productivity.
“The last EMO Hannover had already shown that Industry 4.0 has arrived in the machine tool industry,” says Carl Martin Welcker, General Commissioner of the EMO Hannover 2019. “As the world’s leading innovation platform, we are progressing this trend by focusing on the next development step in production operations: the technical options opened up by digitalization and networking, which are being increasingly reflected in new business models,” he adds. “This doesn’t mean that in future we shall no longer be working on optimizing machines and processes in the traditional way. I am, however, confident that quantum leaps forward in terms of productivity, quality and reliability will be triggered primarily by the new technologies. So in 2019 we will be seeing an abundance of solutions that implement new services for the machine tool industry’s customers.”
Rendering Data Intelligently Usable
For new business models on a broad front, first of all the immense quantities of data generated by digitalization and networking of machines and processes have to be reduced to a usable level. Because only if you can extract the relevant data (smart data) from the superabundance of big data can you derive an entrepreneurial benefit from Industry 4.0. Last year, scientists at the German Academic Society for Production Engineering (WGP) in their position paper on Industry 4.0 had already published an action guide, and shown how big data can be rendered manageable using the data mining method, for example. Besides this guide, the professors at the WGP contribute their state-of-the-art expertise to other bilateral arrangements between the industrial sector and the academic community. Not least, they utilise the EMO Hannover in order to showcase for a global public the projects they are conducting together with industrial partners.
Utilizing Artificial Intelligence
In recent years, artificial intelligence (AI) has achieved some amazing breakthroughs. One of its capabilities, machine learning, enables machines and processes to optimize themselves with the aid of smart data. They detect patterns in data flows, and derive the appropriately responsive actions. The system learns from every situation. Artificial intelligence has already arrived in our everyday reality. To ensure that the mechanical engineering sector also benefits from this, the VDMA has published a study entitled ‘Machine Learning 2030’, which is intended as a kind of roadmap. The recommendations for companies, politicians and researchers are currently being firmed up and implemented in a VDMA working group. It’s now only a question of time before this futuristic scenario, too, arrives in the factories.
The automotive industry, for example, is already making massive use of artificial intelligence, and entering into appropriate alliances. This is adequately exemplified by the cooperative arrangement between Mercedes-Benz and the graphics-chip manufacturer Nvidia. Together, they are aiming to put an AI-based vehicle on the road in the next few years. For machine tool manufacturers, too, artificial intelligence offers an abundance of potential.
Utilizing New Economic Structures
There is fresh evidence almost daily that the use of Industry 4.0 is helping to develop new economic structures. More and more platforms are being created, on which manufacturers and service providers can support their customers from a single source using a product-themed approach. So machine tool manufacturers, too, will be well advised to seize the opportunity and take this trend on board. That’s because the trend towards a platform economy is unmistakable, as current studies show.
There are already some examples here, like Virtual Fort Knox, a Cloud-IT platform for production companies created by the Fraunhofer Institute for Manufacturing Engineering and Automation (IPA) in Stuttgart. “It functions as an IT backbone for Industry 4.0 solutions, and networks production companies with software vendors and machinery manufacturers. But IT companies, control system and machinery manufacturers will also be offering their solutions. “We are seeing how new technologies are influencing and even driving forward developments in the machine tool industry,” says General Commissioner Carl Martin Welcker.
“By September 2019, numerous specific solutions will be available on the market. I can say this with confidence, since many EMO exhibitors will be using this international shop window in order to showcase their corporate capabilities and enhance their profiles,” he adds. Industry 4.0, he adds, creates new customer needs, to which machinery manufacturers must respond in order to remain competitive. Companies that are quick to embrace this new form of economy can not only utilize the trend for new business ideas, but also get actively involved in designing the platforms concerned. Interested parties will once again find inspiration and specific examples of innovative solutions in Hanover in September 2019.
Case Studies
Here is an example of what the trade fair will showcase in terms of new technologies. Cryogenic cooling with carbon dioxide can make a real difference to the cost-effectiveness of machining. The quattroClean system from ACP is suitable for series production and doesn’t just cut manufacturing costs – it also significantly reduces soiling of components and machines. CO2 cooling has become increasingly important as an alternative to conventional cooling lubricant concepts for machining in the last few years. And no wonder, given benefits such as reduced tool wear, the resulting longer service lives, the increased machining rates and the associated productivity increases.
The consequent reduction in production costs can play a key role on the fiercely competitive market. The quattroClean snow jet technology from ACP – Advanced Clean Production GmbH offers a cooling system that has already proven itself in series production and can also be retrofitted into CNC machines and machining centers. Liquid carbon dioxide, which forms the basis for the quattroClean system, is a by-product of chemical processes and energy generation from biomass and can thus be classed as environmentally neutral. The CO2 starts at room temperature and is only transformed from a liquid to a solid state – in the form of fine snow crystals – when it leaves the non-wearing circular two-component nozzle.
The CO2 snow is bundled by a circular jacketed jet of compressed air, transferred to the process zone at supersonic speed and has a temperature as low as minus 78 degrees Celsius. The patented jacketed jet technology delivers constant pressure, which prevents the nozzle from icing up and ensures consistently good cooling. At the same time, only the quantity of carbon dioxide actually needed for the desired cooling effect is supplied.
Here is another case study: The Michelin Group, which is primarily known as a tyre manufacturer, is contributing its years of know-how in 3D metal printing to the AddUp joint venture it has founded with technology developer and plant engineer Fives. There’s absolutely no doubt about it. The potential of 3D printing is so huge that traditional manufacturing processes will be replaced in the short to medium term in many sectors. Michelin, for example, is already working on using a 3D printer to produce entire tyres, but these are miles away from actually being used on our roads. Nevertheless, the additive manufacturing of three-dimensional parts has already become established as an industry standard in Michelin’s production processes.
The layered structure using selective laser welding is an integral part of developing highly complex tyre baking molds for vulcanization. This will make it possible to design molds that would be impossible with conventional production methods based on metal forming. For example, the highly complex baking molds for cutting-edge winter tyres with sipes positioned at precise angles and distances already contain up to 4,500 metal strips, some of them extremely intricate. Michelin has had the foresight to have been looking at the possibilities of additive manufacturing in mold making for 15 years and used first-generation 3D printers to create prototype tyre baking molds. The company first utilized its own machines to produce molds using metal printing in 2009.
Michelin has now joined forces with a partner for the latest step into the future of metal printing, forming the joint venture AddUp with French technology developer and plant engineer Fives. As a specialist in the additive manufacturing of metal parts, AddUp develops, produces and sells products and global industrial solutions using 3D printing. Parts up to 143 inches long based on steel, nickel, titanium or aluminum alloys can be manufactured, which makes the innovative joint venture one of the leading companies on the market. Its portfolio ranges from manufacturing components to developing and supplying complete machines for production.
About EMO Hannover 2019
EMO Hannover 2019 – the world’s premier trade fair for the metalworking sector – will be held from September 16 to 21 where international manufacturers of production technology will be spotlighting smart engineering. Under the motto of ‘Smart Technologies Driving Tomorrow’s Production’, the trade fair will be showcasing the entire bandwidth of modern-day metalworking technology, which is the heart of every industrial production process. The fair will be presenting the latest machines, plus efficient technical solutions, product-supportive services, sustainability in the production process, and much more. The principal focus of the EMO Hannover is on metal-cutting and forming machine tools, production systems, high-precision tools, automated material flows, computer technology, industrial electronics and accessories.
The trade visitors to the EMO come from all major sectors of industry, such as machinery and plant manufacturers, the automotive industry and its component suppliers, the aerospace sector, precision mechanics and optics, shipbuilding, medical technology, tool and die manufacture, steel and lightweight construction. The EMO Hannover is the world’s most important international meeting point for production technology specialists from all over the planet. The EMO Hannover 2017 attracted almost 2,230 exhibitors from 44 different countries, and around 1,30,000 trade visitors from 160 nations. EMO is a registered trademark of the European Association of the Machine Tool Industries CECIMO.
