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Industry 4.0 - How AI, IIoT, and Digital Twins are Helping Industries
- Authors
- Name
- The Solvative Team
- @solveforward
Digital twins technology is merging the worlds of Artificial Intelligence (AI), Internet of Things (IoT), and Data analytics. Being the digital representation of a system of physical objects, the digital twin technology has expanded to include factories, buildings, and cities.
Expanding the concept further, processes and people are likely to have digital twins. It is a computer program that takes real-world data about systems and physical objects as input and produces simulations and predictions on how information can affect them.
Today, businesses worldwide use digital twins in various ways, from operational performance to product development. Although the market for digital twins is small, Increasing IoT adoption and digitization are driving the demand for digital twins and accelerating the growth for AI digital twins. The manufacturing sector is the biggest market for digital twins as it offers numerous benefits to this sector, such as
- Improved productivity
- Using predictive maintenance leads to low maintenance costs
- Accelerated production time
- Offers customer satisfaction
- It makes it possible to test the product before little manufacturing.
Strong Relation Between AI and Digital Twins
Digital twins and AI have mutualist relations as both contribute to each other's success. Digital twins help businesses to generate data that is simulated and can contribute towards AI models training. Moreover, digital twins can also create an environment to test machine learning.
On the other hand, Digital twins can benefit from AI. Both AI and machine learning algorithms help businesses build digital twins and process a large amount of data from digital twins.
Digital twin technology is finding its way to train employees, improve operational capabilities, test products before launch to fix any issues. Artificial Intelligence, machine learning digital twins, are also being used for analyzing operations models irrespective of the location of the product and equipment. The Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) also benefits from digital twins as the technology can help stimulate applications before its launch. Digital twin offers real-time data that can reduce maintenance issues and provide better output from production.
Conversation with Machines
Advancements in deep learning and Natural Language Processing (NLP) have led to intelligent and better conversational capable bots such as Chatbots, virtual assistants, and actual robots. Moreover, with the increasing prevalence of IIoT, bots are likely to evolve in the future and act as a middleman between humans and machines.
Moreover, with improvements in technologies processing natural language is becoming easy for virtual assistants such as Siri and Alexa. The first wave of IoT and Chatbot interaction has already begun, and the adoption is also increasing.
Conversational User Interface (CUI) is gaining popularity by offering human-like engagement with machines. Digital twin artificial intelligence is also used to simplify human-machine conversation and gain insights into real-time data.
Companies are also focusing on offering systems to enable easy human interaction with software; for instance, Solvative worked with its manufacturing client on CUI interface, helping plant supervisors to quickly get information on machine and equipment condition and product quality by analyzing product quality the data offered by factory systems and sensors.
Machines in the manufacturing units also use Open Platform Communication Unified Architecture (OPC UA) that Chatbots can understand and navigate based on the search criteria by users and fetch data in real-time.
ERP software has been around for a long time and has reached a level with little room left for innovation. Thus, ERP software vendors seek efficiency and enhancement through new technologies like the Internet of Things (IoT) and Artificial Intelligence (AI). Intelligent ERP can also be seen in the future with characteristics such as using cloud deployment, leveraging machine learning, and enhancing business processes via predictive analysis and machine learning.
What are the Challenges in the Digital Twin Market?
Digital twin uses accurate analysis to provide rapid investigation and real-time decisions. Digital twin and AI can give digital models, processes, and objects with composition, integration, simulation, and ability to sense and some other capabilities. However, to achieve these capabilities, the digital twin should overcome various challenges such as.
Project Collaboration
Digital twins should collaborate on different projects; for instance, they may collaborate within a combined digital twin and at the same time connect with other digital twins in various contexts.
Capturing Physical Properties
The digital twin should model complex objects, including the city, store, irrigation system, and shopping process. It should also model simple things such as buildings, human beings, vehicles, and airplanes. This can be achieved by monitoring and capturing the physical properties of objects, adjusting the scale, and stimulating behavior. Moreover, with new technologies, digital twin AI modeling is also gaining traction.
Detecting and Reacting to Changes
Digital twins should detect and react to the changes in real-time. Along with this, identifying and resolving execution differences is essential to ensure accurate and consistent communication.
Automatic Updates in Real-time
The digital twin should predict its functionality and size changes in real-time and make necessary changes or alter as and when required.
Various developments are forthcoming in the digital twin technology. These developments include several compound platforms that actively interact at two levels: the digital twin level that sets the connection between object and process digital twin, and the virtual twin level with the relationship between object and process virtual twins.
Future of Artificial Intelligence Bots in the Internet of Things
Internet of Things (IoT) and Artificial Intelligence (AI) are likely to modernize the world in the coming years as both contribute significantly to the new technology that has the power to update the world. Both AI and IoT can create intelligent machines that provide data and support decision-making processes with little to no human interference.
The large amount of data produced by IIoT sensors and devices can be analyzed and utilized using AI, while chatbots provide an easy way to access data. Moreover, with the rise in IIoT, more data is being produced innovative equipment and sensors; this requires digital twin and AI to manage huge amounts of data.
Governments along with companies are also focusing on using new technologies to build smart cities. For instance, Hexagon is providing digital twins for cities that can help governments plan better. The new model consists of a digital terrain model, 3D building model, LiDAR point cloud, and HD photos. The company has created 3D digital twins of the world, as the digital twins of cities will help the government monitor assets and model risk. This technology can also help in the development of infrastructure projects for better communication.
Technologies including IoT, digital twin, and AI are also gaining traction in the patient care and healthcare sector. For instance, a digital twin of an organ or patient can help health practitioners to practice complex procedures in a simulated environment than on actual patients.
To fully leverage the power of digital twins, your company needs to detect and react in real-time. You also need a strong partner that can help you with all aspects of marketing strategy, so you don't have any blind spots along the way. Innovative technologies can help companies perform various complex tasks, resulting in better execution of business strategies, and can also help in better decision-making in the volatile business environment.
If you have questions about digital transformation that you’d like for us to cover, please email contact@solveforward.com or @solveforward on Twitter. We’d love to hear from you!