Archive for January, 2020
Monday, January 27th, 2020
Engineers at numerous companies still prepare their 3D data manually in order to make it digitally available to colleagues in purchasing or production planning. Not so at the Brose Group. The manufacturer of mechatronic components and systems for the automotive industry has completely automated the preparation, conversion and provision of CATIA data in JT format using PROSTEP solutions.
With 26,000 employees and annual revenues of 6.2 billion euros, the Bamberg-headquartered Brose Group ranks among the world’s top 40 automotive suppliers. Every second new vehicle that rolls off the production line worldwide is equipped with at least one Brose product to increase safety, comfort and efficiency. The core competence of the company, whose success story began with a crank drive for retracting car windows, is the synthesis of mechanical, electrical, electronic and sensor systems. The product range includes door systems, liftgates, adjustment systems for front and rear seats as well as electric motors and drives for a number of different of uses in vehicles.
The (autonomous) driving experience of the future begins as soon as you get in a vehicle – with doors that open automatically, provided that there is nothing in way, seats that adjust automatically to whoever is driving and a preheated vehicle interior. Door, closure and seating systems are thus becoming complex, mechatronic or even cyberphysical systems whose development not only requires new tools, methods and processes but also a more efficient use of existing information. “Far too much information is still contained in TIFF and PDF/A documents and is therefore not available in digital form to downstream processes,” says Walter Redinger, head of Development and Production Systems/Information Systems at Brose.
The IT department has therefore defined a clear digitalization strategy together with the company’s business operations. In addition to the automation of design processes using assistance systems and the virtual validation of prototypes, it also involves an approach to OEM collaboration that is oriented to a greater extent towards, for example, systems/model-based systems engineering (MBSE) and the use of new technologies such as augmented reality (AR). The objective is to have a digital master that not only includes the 3D models but also the electrics/electronics (E/E) information and software versions and makes all this information digitally available.
Multi-layer PLM landscape
Redinger goes on to say that the key to digitalization is an end-to-end PLM tool chain that covers everything from requirements management to designing the software, printed circuit boards and mechanical components through to test procedures and simulation, including digital production planning and control. “The aim behind this end-to-end digitalization is to integrate the individual disciplines more tightly and enhance the core efficiencies in the processes. This not only requires cultural change in the organization but also places new demands on our PLM landscape.”
The PLM landscape at Brose comprises multiple layers. The PLM backbone is a SAP system that is used to create parts, materials and BOMs, approve drawings and manage changes. It is closely integrated with MS SharePoint, which 5,000 Brose employees worldwide use to handle their customer projects. ENOVIA VPM, the team data management (TDM) system used for mechanical and E/E development to date, is currently being replaced by the 3DEXPERIENCE (3DX) platform. The software developers are currently still using Virtual DOORS software and the Rational Suite set of tools for application lifecycle management (ALM) but will gradually be switching to codeBeamer ALM software solution.
As Redinger says, OpenPDM assumes the role of a hub for connecting the different environments within the PLM landscape. This applies in particular to the successfully implemented project for ENOVIA/3DX-SAP integration, which allows CATIA data to be converted into JT format and made available worldwide. Brose has used the integration platform and PROSTEP’s services in the past, for example to provide joint venture partners with selected data and synchronize it at regular intervals. The solution was also used when the company took over Continental’s electric motor division and the division’s PLM data had to be extracted from Continental’s environment. “PROSTEP is a long-standing and reliable partner with well-functioning tools and very experienced staff,” says Redinger.
3D data for downstream processes
Unlike other automotive suppliers, Brose uses its own CATIA environment for mechanical development rather than the system used by the respective customer. All the engineers at the 25 development sites – i.e. approximately 1,000 employees – use a uniform methodology and apply the same standards, thus making it easier to collaborate on cross-site development projects. “Working in the customer’s environment would be easier for the departments, but would make it more difficult to exploit the synergies offered by standardization and data reuse,” says Redinger. The IT department nevertheless maintains about 30 different customer environments in order to prepare the CAD data and convert it into the respective customer formats. PROSTEP’s OpenDXM GlobalX data exchange platform has been managing data conversion and exchange for a number of years.
Up until now, only 2D drawings derived from CATIA were transferred to the SAP document management system as TIFF or PDF/A and approved there so that they could be made available for downstream processes such as procurement or production planning. Only then did the engineers approve the associated 3D models in ENOVIA. When buyers or suppliers needed 3D models in addition to the 2D drawings to process requests for quotation, engineers had to prepare them, filter out certain details if necessary and convert them to the supplier’s preferred format. The manual processing was not only time-consuming but also had the disadvantage that the purchasing department could never be sure that all suppliers had received the same level of information.
In order to simplify the enterprise-wide use of 3D data, Brose implemented a solution with PROSTEP’s support that automatically triggers JT conversion when 3D data is approved in ENOVIA, or in the future in 3DX, and transfer the JT models to SAP. The solution is essentially based on OpenPDM with connectors to ENOVIA/3DX and SAP as well as PROSTEP’s newly developed batch processing framework (BPF), which manages the third-party converter for converting CATIA data into JT and other formats already available at Brose. When it comes to automatically importing data into the PLM backbone, the data exchange platform accesses SAP web services that ensure that the JT models are correctly linked with the BOMs and can be automatically updated and versioned if changes are made. If a part or assembly is modified, a JT file with a new index is created once the part or assembly has been approved so that its development history is retained in SAP.
PROSTEP has adapted the solution so that the individual process steps, from exporting the data to converting it and importing it into SAP, can be performed in parallel and independently of each other. The reason for this is that Brose also wants to gradually make 3D data from projects launched before the solution went live available in SAP. This will significantly increase the volume of data to be converted. As Redinger says, between 100 and 150 JT files are currently being uploaded to SAP every day.
Savings in downstream processes
Redinger admits that the fact that Brose needs individual parts as well as subassemblies and assemblies converted leads to certain redundancies. “But it has the advantage that the JT models can be exchanged more easily and used for downstream processes. The buyer can send them directly to the supplier, at least when requesting quotations. JT is ideal, especially in the early offer phase, because it is a uniform format with a reduced data volume that does not disclose too much know-how. It is also enjoying growing acceptance in the automotive industry.”
The information contained in the 3D models made available in JT format can be used in a number of different downstream processes since relatively few details are filtered out during conversion. Although product manufacturing information (PMI) is not yet embedded, the JT models are extremely helpful to production planners when they want to obtain a quick overview of the shape of certain components without having to always bother the engineers. If, however, the 3D models are to be made available earlier in the process, generating them in JT format would have to performed separate from approving drawings, says Redinger – possibly with a restriction note or for a selected group of users.
In general, all employees with access to the PLM backbone also have access to the JT models. A simple JT viewer is available in SAP for displaying the models. The IT department provides fee-based visualization tools with an extended functional scope to users who want to use the JT data to carry out clash detection analysis for example. However, this only applies to internal users. In the case of suppliers, Brose recommends that they use the free JT2Go viewer. The company’s objective is to get all its suppliers to start using JT over the course of the next few months so that it can do away with manual conversion entirely.
It is not only the engineers who benefit from automatic JT conversion. “We are seeing significant savings in the downstream processes – thanks in part to the format’s clear-cut structure,” says Redinger. He expects additional benefits from more widespread use of JT data in other application scenarios such as review processes, which are currently performed on the basis of CATIA data. The availability of 3D data in SAP lays the groundwork for the digital master, which now of course needs to be rounded off with other information that fills any gaps.
By Udo Hering
No Comments »
Tuesday, January 21st, 2020
The shipyard thyssenkrupp Marine Systems has commissioned PROSTEP AG’s shipbuilding experts to draw up a roadmap for the shipbuilding production area in Kiel to digitally integrate manufacturing. The shipbuilders want to make the coordination processes in development, production and assembly more digitally integrated and thus accelerate manufacturing of steel construction.
Today, the departments and companies involved in shipbuilding generally still exchange their product information on the basis of drawings and often even paper, which makes coordination time-consuming and error-prone. Consistent information models and the use of digital technologies can significantly improve the integration of cross-departmental processes. A prerequisite for this is the reliable identification of interruptions and bottlenecks in the information flows.
Starting from the existing enterprise architecture, PROSTEP used a standardized method of capability-based potential analysis, which is based on value stream mapping, to create a capability roadmap for shipbuilding production. In a sense, it describes the target status and allows our shipbuilding experts to identify potential for improvement in the information flow and IT support for the communication processes between design, work preparation and steel production.
Together with the project team at thyssenkrupp Marine Systems, PROSTEP’s shipbuilding experts have identified three key areas of action with 20 concrete measures.
They are to be implemented in the next project steps:
- Firstly, the establishment of a digital twin of hull construction with the aim of being able to map and control the production processes digitally;
- Secondly, the implementation of digital documentation processes for the quality inspections of welding processes and seams and
- Thirdly, the digital connection of the semi-finished product and material suppliers to the digital production processes.
The interdisciplinary team not only identified the measures, but also prioritized them and arranged them in a roadmap. After a project duration of only six weeks, it was able to present the project results to the central production management of the Kiel shipyard. This was a complete success for the shipbuilding production division, which hopes that it will be able to prioritize its digitization projects at the Kiel location more effectively.
No Comments »
Friday, January 17th, 2020
Around a year ago, PROSTEP AG acquired a majority shareholding in Bartscher & Hasenäcker Consulting GmbH in order to enhance its expertise in the area of PLM/ALM for E/E (electrics/electronics) and software development. In this interview, Philipp Hasenäcker explains what E/E and software mean for PLM/ALM and what synergies he expects to achieve from working with PROSTEP.
Question: Bartscher & Hasenäcker Consulting specializes in PLM/ALM for E/E and software. Was this your business model right from the start?
Hasenäcker: Our current specialization was not originally an explicit business model. Instead, it has evolved over time. To start with, we were involved in a wide variety of PLM projects for a large carmaker, but we were always very close to the departments responsible for development. And it was here that we also became aware of the shortcomings in E/E and software development. The various organizational units for mechatronics development had their own custom processes and methods and the system landscape was extremely heterogeneous, having many isolated solutions that lacked a unifying framework. We then had the good fortune to be able to participate as external consultants in a major PDM project for E/E thanks to the expertise we already had in the OEM’s PLM toolchain and our sound reputation in the organization. We very quickly recognized that this was a crucially important issue for the future, and from that point on we focused all our energies on this area.
Question: What is the significance of E/E and software in today’s automotive industry?
Hasenäcker: From long years of experience, all the major carmakers know how to produce high-quality, first-class mechanical products. Increasingly, however, the things that really make a difference are mechatronic assistance systems, smart features and, more recently, digital services and the fusion of the vehicle with its environment. It is a sign of the times that a highly innovative technology such as the MBUX multimedia system is first introduced in the A-Class rather than in the S-Class in order to attract new, digitally-minded target groups. As Daimler CIO Jan Brecht once said at the EDM Forum, the company must transform itself from a product-oriented to a service-oriented group, and software, whether as a component of mechatronic systems or in the form of digital services, will be the decisive driver for this transformation. Against this backdrop, I am firmly convinced that it is hardly possible to overstate the importance of E/E and software for the automotive industry.
Question: Doesn’t the amount of software in the vehicle sometimes scare you a little? Software is never free of errors and can be hacked.
Hasenäcker: In my opinion, and the statistics back me up, the many different assistance systems have made driving significantly safer. In 2019, there were fewer fatalities on the roads than at any time since statistics began more than 60 years ago. Quite apart from that, we nowadays have few qualms about boarding a commercial aircraft in which the autopilot takes over a large part of the flight, using state-of-the-art avionics and highly complex software. Future success will undoubtedly crucially depend on whether we are able to master the heterogeneity in the development and management of software – over the entire lifecycle of vehicles.
Question: What are the particular challenges in E/E and software development?
Hasenäcker: To start with, the number of people involved in the development of mechatronic systems is much larger and more heterogeneous than in the traditional mechanical environment. The hardware developer, for example, usually doesn’t even know who is developing the software. There are complex supplier relationships and many different responsibilities, and all of these combine to ultimately ensure that the system functions robustly and consistently. This results in a considerable level of complexity that has to be managed in one way or another.
Question: What are the concrete challenges regarding PLM?
Hasenäcker: In our experience, one of the core challenges is compatibility management, in order to make potential conflicts transparent for all parties involved at all times. We are talking about networked mechatronic systems with many dependencies that have to be compatible with each other both internally and externally. The whole issue of traceability is another challenge. It must be possible to trace back the huge volume of information in mechatronic systems and components, and it all needs to be documented and versioned along the lifecycle. It is no secret that software develops far faster than, for example, the housing of an ECU or the PCB. An unbroken traceability chain continues to be an essential aspect of verification and certification processes, and it becomes all the more important the more the industry considers highly automated or autonomous driving as of level 3 and higher.
Question: Why are there still no suitable IT systems available for this? Have PLM vendors been caught napping?
Hasenäcker: PLM vendors will undoubtedly disagree, but I do not see PLM as a monolithic system, but rather as a composite made up of processes, methods and ancillary IT applications. The challenge in such a scenario is to combine traditional PLM and ALM capabilities and functionalities. ALM (application lifecycle management) has to be tightly integrated in this environment in order to manage the software artifacts appropriately. The interface between ALM and PLM is highly individual. In other words, a custom solution is always needed for the customer’s particular ecosystem, product profile and requirements.
Question: What kind of solutions do you develop in customer projects?
Hasenäcker: Our approach involves first working with the customer to build a joint understanding at the level of business processes in order to reveal the heterogeneous nature of the company’s operations. In a second step, we make use of our experience and best practices to help the customer design the actual solutions. In other words, we are not simply process consultants: Our proposals go far deeper, encompassing concepts and specifications, right down to the attribute level in the data models of affected IT applications. The only thing we do not do ourselves is realizing the software for the IT applications. In this area, we work together with partners and now, of course, also with PROSTEP.
Question: So you design integrated tool chains for E/E and software based on the process requirements and the IT systems used?
Hasenäcker: That’s right. We are particularly concerned with the integration of existing applications and the way they communicate with each other and exchange information. However, custom software is also used in a significant number of our projects because there are no suitable off-the-shelf solutions. Incidentally, the PDM project for E/E mentioned above also resulted in a fully customized software application.
Question: So the PDM project on E/E for a carmaker has been your most important customer project to date?
Hasenäcker: Yes, I think that’s fair to say. The project provided huge impetus for us because we were able to have a positive impact in some development domains. As a result, we are now at home in the entire field of E/E and software management, with a clear focus on all software artifacts that are in some way significant for the ECUs. And we are extensively involved in the design of E/E release management. This is a core E/E integration process that ensures that up-to-date versions of E/E components, complete with hardware and software information, are made available for testing and validation in a coordinated way at defined points in the vehicle development process.
Question: What synergies are you hoping to achieve together with PROSTEP?
Hasenäcker: Up to now, our biggest challenge has been our focus on a single large carmaker. We hope that working with PROSTEP will enable us to acquire new customers and projects in the automotive and other industries, as the company is a highly respected partner for PDM and PLM throughout Germany and beyond. We are working together intensively to firmly establish our range of solutions for E/E and software in the PROSTEP Group so that we can use the enhanced profile to acquire new customers or address new fields with existing customers.
Question: Is this already making a noticeable difference to day-to-day business?
Hasenäcker: At operational level, there are already a number of projects in which we are bundling our strengths. For example, we had a contract to develop a solution for extended functional testing in the field of E/E in which we brought PROSTEP on board as a development partner. The staff at the Polish location programmed the software for us so that we were able to offer the customer an overall solution from one provider. And there are already two joint projects for another large OEM in which we want to become more deeply involved in the future. Together with colleagues from PLM strategy consulting, we have also expanded the capability landscape to include E/E-specific aspects so that it can also be used when dealing with questions relating to mechatronic products.
Question: Are you also involved in the subsidized projects for the digital validation of autonomous driving functions, in which PROSTEP is playing an important role?
Hasenäcker: Up to now, our involvement has only been peripheral, but we have already taken steps to intensify our collaboration in this area as well. I attach great importance to these projects because we need common standards for autonomous driving. Standards are essential if German carmakers and suppliers want to continue to be strong in the future.
Mr. Hasenäcker, thank you very much for talking to us.
(This interview was conducted by Michael Wendenburg)
About Philipp Hasenäcker:
Philipp Hasenäcker (born in 1980) heads up Bartscher & Hasenäcker Consulting GmbH (BHC) in Böblingen, which is part of the PROSTEP Group. Hasenäcker hails from Paderborn and studied industrial engineering in Detmold. He has been working as an external consultant for PLM/ALM for E/E and software in the automotive industry for more than 15 years. Since 2016 he has been co-owner and managing director of BHC.
No Comments »
|
