Dassault Systèmes and Omron plan to combine their respective expertise in virtual twins and industrial automation technologies to transform industrial production, the partners said in a release.The new approach is necessary because today’s factories often face a critical issue: product design, automation, and production systems operate in silos. And that fragmentation leads to longer commissioning times, higher error risks, and limited flexibility.The partners say their solution is to converge information technology (IT) and operational technology (OT), replacing typical fragmented industrial systems with AI-driven, software-defined manufacturing. Specifically, they will create a seamless link between 3D design and simulation in the virtual world, and robots, sensors and production lines in the physical world.When applied to the manufacturing sector, that approach will let users validate production systems virtually before deploying them, thus reducing errors, costs, and risks, they said.Following this approach, manufacturers’ production lines will be designed, simulated, and validated in a virtual environment. So performance, safety, and maintenance can be tested to correct errors before real-world deployment. Once the physical line is installed, real-time data from sensors, controllers, and robots is fed back into the virtual twin. This enables comparison between real and simulated behavior, fine-tuning, and predictive maintenance to reduce costs and risks.
