Cloud Platform for Robotics Operation and Maintenance and Process Management Based on Industrial Internet

Intelligent Welding Cloud Platform © Risong Technology

I. Background

The project case was developed by Guangzhou Risong Intelligent Technology Holding Co., Ltd., and was selected as the application direction of platform integration innovation for the 2020 Industrial Internet Pilot Demonstration Project of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. To promote the digitalization, networking and intelligent transformation of enterprises and accelerate the integration of manufacturing and Internet, Risong Technology has established a remote operation and maintenance platform for robotic and intelligent devices based on remote operation and maintenance of robots and aiming at process data management. The platform integrates technologies such as the device cloud platform and process expert database, and can provide customers with services such as device status monitoring, operation and maintenance order management, spare parts management, fault statistical analysis, spot check and tour inspection, remote operation and maintenance assistance, etc., thus enhancing customer service experience and increasing customer engagement, from selling devices alone to providing customers with digitalized factory overall solutions. Therefore, the corporate competitiveness and profitability are improved. The implementation of the industrial Internet platform project has helped us realize the transition from the traditional on-site service to the remote robotic operation and maintenance plus mobile app service, greatly reducing the number of business trips and reducing carbon emissions. The number of after-sales service personnel has been reduced by 30%, thus saving labor costs and enhancing the sustainable corporate competitiveness.

The project provides an efficient technology for remote cooperation and communication based on the industrial Internet platform, integrating the industrial Internet, cloud computation technology, mobile communication, etc., with the remote device operation and maintenance as the target application scenario, and has developed a remote device operation and maintenance system, providing reliable data bases for operation and maintenance service personnel through the cloud platform, and effectively solving some common difficulties and tricky points in the operation and maintenance processes of the industry.

In this project, artificial intelligence technology is applied to industrial application scenarios, and advanced AI technology is used to guide and assist actual production, thus reducing labor costs and improving production and management efficiency of enterprises. As the foundation of industrial artificial intelligence, huge amounts of high-quality operation, maintenance and process data is particularly important for intelligent manufacturing enterprises to become digitalized and smarter. According to its rich experience in the industry and advanced information technology, Risong Technology has developed a process management platform based on IT-based management methods, which can effectively manage all kinds of data generated in the production process, and with overall consideration of historical data, recommend the optimal parameters according to the target scenarios, effectively improving the accuracy of parameter selection, reducing the rejection rate and shortening the time for launching customers' new products, and fully activating and utilizing the company's invisible data assets.

II. Main Practices

1. Methods and measures

Firstly, by combining the experience of engineers with information management technology, the process management platform can help enterprises effectively manage the process data involved in various industries and processing methods, and fully solve the problem of lack of effective management methods due to the wide range of processes involved.

Secondly, besides process data, the process management platform also provides data sheets such as the device library, joint library, and knowledge base to help enterprises manage more process data. In addition, the process database utilizes the process data accumulation by Risong Technology for years and advanced artificial intelligence technology to further develop the automatic planning of path and process parameters on the traditional process management platform, and automatically complete the functions of process design, process flow optimization, and quality prediction, so that enterprises can obtain direct practical value from the data, and the accumulated data can guide the process links, reduce the production and management costs of enterprises, and promote the transformation of enterprises into digital and digital-driven enterprises.

The remote operation and maintenance module of Risong Technology Industrial Internet Platform integrates the knowledge base of Risong Technology robot corrective maintenance, which can effectively support Risong Technology's field engineers, partners and customers in detecting, checking and dealing with various problems in the operation of devices.

2. Main work

The process database expert system independently developed by Risong is based on artificial intelligence technology. It realizes automatic planning of path and process parameters through machine learning and deep learning, and automatically completes process design, process flow optimization and quality prediction. According to the process qualification data and production verification data, the database can carry out self-learning based on the Internet of Things, using controllers and sensors to acquire all kinds of parameters and quality data, constantly improving the database, and realizing self-adaptive and self-adjusting advanced process technology through artificial intelligence technology.

3. Issues to be solved

The service objects, service scenarios and issues of the project include but are not limited to: (1) For device manufacturers: improving after-sales efficiency and reduce after-sales costs, increasing after-sales revenue, improving sales of devices and accessories, and providing big data support for product improvement. (2) For device users and operators: improving production efficiency and reducing energy consumption, preventing device failure and reducing losses, improving operational efficiency and reducing maintenance costs, improve product quality and reducing production ramp-up time, and reducing production cost.

The platform can interact remotely to effectively reduce the contact frequency between people and the spread probability of the COVID-19 pandemic. Today, when the pandemic is still raging, it can play an important role in ensuring the normal operation of customers' site devices, showing strong resilience. Different from the traditional site-oriented face-to-face operation and maintenance assistance, the platform fundamentally eliminates the possible spread of the COVID-19, so it ensures the health of operation and maintenance personnel and service personnel, and at the same time effectively ensures the normal operation of customer site devices. In the face of the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, thanks to innovative operation and maintenance methods, the platform is not affected by the pandemic at all, and it is full of resilience.

The platform can significantly improve the timeliness and economy of the platform's participation in corporate operation and maintenance businesses, reduce energy waste and effectively reduce carbon emissions. Traditional operation and maintenance methods require operation and maintenance service personnel to provide on-site services for customers. For both Party A and Party B, the timeliness and economy of operation and maintenance services are not high. For Party A, failure to locate and solve problems the first time when faults occur means device downtime, which means idling of other devices and letting personnel waiting. For Party B, whether arranging personnel for long-term on-site attendance or on-site service after problems occur, it means the additional transportation cost and the waste of effective working hours. For traditional service organizations or departments, the annual transportation cost is a high-expenditure item. All these can be effectively solved after the emergence of the remote operation and maintenance mode. In the remote operation and maintenance mode, after problems occur, the timeliness of operation and maintenance services is greatly improved, and Party B's transportation cost can be greatly reduced. The improvement in energy efficiency of Party A and Party B will eventually translate into the reduction of energy consumption, thus effectively reducing carbon emissions.

III. Effectiveness and Experience

1. Characteristic achievements

Compared with the existing traditional process database, Risong Technology's process management platform covers a wider range of industries, involving more comprehensive processing methods and processes, and incorporates the expert system based on process big data into the database, which not only realizes efficient data management, but also realizes information extraction from data to guide the processes for improving production efficiency.

With a wider range of industry standards and data and full coverage of all kinds of process specification parameters, the real omni-directional, multi-angle, and high-efficiency data management is realized.

With "data-driven" as the core idea, the functions of self-learning, self-adaptation and self-adjustment are realized to a great extent using artificial intelligence technology and advanced process technology.

The establishment of the process management platform is, so to speak, able to meet the needs of enterprises for data management, and at the same time, it can generate direct guidance for the process through the expert system to help reduce production costs and improve efficiency. With its knowledge and experience in manufacturing technology, management technology and information technology application, the project is obviously advantageous in competitiveness.

With this project, Risong Technology can share and exchange on-site experience with its partners and customers, and form a knowledge system of device operation failure among them, so that the three can fully communicate in the system, and make use of the advantages of the Internet, so that more customers can experience more efficient and considerate on-site support services.

2. Experience that can be replicated and popularized

Based on the industrial Internet, the project can form solutions such as remote device operation and maintenance and process management, solve key problems such as process optimization and intelligent tour inspection, and form application cases in automotive equipment and construction machinery industries, and has the feasibility of being promoted to other industries.

This project can accelerate the transformation of the manufacturing production mode, management mode and business paradigm, and help improve the quality of manufacturing products and services. After the first demonstration of the project technology, its technology and application mode can be extended to many fields such as aviation, aerospace, shipbuilding, machinery, automotive, electronics and electricity. The project is of important theoretical significance and practical engineering value.

On the basis of comprehensive consideration of advancement, operability, economy, industrialization and other factors, the research scheme and technical route are formulated based on the relevant research results of the relatively mature and advanced technology and the existing corporate technical solutions. Through pilots and demonstration, new models and formats that can be replicated and promoted will be formed, promoting the innovative development of the industrial Internet and artificial intelligence.

Contributions to UN's Sustainable Development Goals

The project establishes resilient infrastructure, promotes inclusive and sustainable industrial development, and ensures sustainable consumption and production patterns by accelerating innovation. In addition, it also further strengthens the implementation methods of sustainable development and activates the global partnership for sustainable development through technological innovation and global promotion and popularization of new production technologies. It complies with Articles 9, 12 and 17 of Sustainable Development Goals.