The Digital Transformation Planning Director of Lan-You technology, attends Intelligent Automotive Manufacturing High-quality Development Forum held by Global Intelligent Manufacturing Academy

(Third from the right: TanQingming)

The electrification, networking, intelligence and sharing of vehicles foretell a bright future for the industry. The march toward automotive digitalization and intelligence is not only the technical pursuit of automotive workers, but also a good life vision for them. As an important aspect of this trend, intelligent manufacturing is an inevitable choice.

On October 21, at the Global Intelligent Manufacturing Academy—Intelligent Automotive Manufacturing High-quality Development Forum, Lan-You Technology’s Digital Transformation Planning Director Tan Qingming analyzed the challenges facing intelligent automotive manufacturing and the counter measures, introduced Lan-You Technology’s whole-value chain capacity in intelligent manufacturing, and predicted the future direction of intelligent automotive manufacturing in the topic “both aspects of intelligent manufacturing required for high-quality development——Lan-You Technology’s thought about the path of intelligent manufacturing”.

PART.1

Intelligent manufacturing asan inevitable choice in the automotive digitalization and intelligence trend

“In the future, products, R&D, after market operations and new businesses will bring more business value, and manufacturing will be faced with transformation and upgrading to keep reducing costs and maintain profits, there by leaving more cost space for R&D and after market operations,” Tan Qingming started thinking from the“ smiling curve” in the profit structure change of the automotive industry. He said, with the increase of product and R&D value brought by software-defined vehicles, and in consideration of infinite possibilities in the automotive aftermarket contained in new business models, the profit share of conventional manufacturing in the whole automotive value chain will further decline, making it more difficult to reduce manufacturing costs.

The reason for the current dilemma of production, marketing and supply for car makers is unsmooth information, failure to create a holistic perspective for systematic thinking, and difficulty to form a coordinated production, marketing and supply system.

Tan Qingming thought that the only means to break this dilemma was the intelligent upgrading of manufacture, in which consideration should be given to both lean management and intelligence to support sustainable and high-speed enterprise development.

PART.2

Bridging information and time gaps through lean management and intelligence

Tan Qingming explained that lean management was infinite synchronization with the customers, “including quality, cost and time synchronization, namely to ensure the quality the customers needs, eliminate wastes that are valueless for the customer, and deliver products and services within the period required by the customer in the manufacturing process.”

How to realize lean managementin manufacturing? Tan Qingming thought that this should be “examined in further detail” through the whole process of vehicle production and marketing. First,we should solve the problems of complex product platforms and excessively rapid growth in the number of models, and establish a configurable product data logic; on the other hand, we should optimize the marketing and production processes to ensure quick response to individual needs in segments, and reduce operating risks.

“To make the supply chain and manufacturing process more flexible, we should think about improvement from the perspective of the whole process from customer requirements to terminal delivery, and refine every aspect, ” said Tan Qingming. This is just like waiting for the red light to change, and a few more seconds for each car will lead to congestion; in contrast, a train with carriages connected eliminates waiting time and improves efficiency greatly. “When applied to production practice, such concept is the ‘Car-Flow’ tool, which eliminates waiting in the process and reduces unreasonable inventories arising from waiting.”

For intelligence, data operationalization is the foundation. “An enterprise should build its independent connectivity, conduct data governance and application, and establish a digitalization culture with service innovation dominated by businesses,” Tan Qingming suggested. This should be done in the following four ways:

First, process innovation

Match the production process with site conditions and operation modes adaptively, and develop and applymolds, tooling, equipment, etc. digitally;

Second, manufacturing excellence

Keep improving quality,equipment efficiency and industrial network security by applying advanced technologies to ensure stable and efficient manufacturing;

Third, agile services

Provide quick and efficientservice support for the manufacturing process by applying digital and communication technologies;

Fourth, smart management

Keep improving field management capacity, and operational and decision-making efficiency by applying such advanced technologies as big data analysis and AI.

PART.3

Integrated solutions offered by Lan-You Technology

Lan-You Technology has done pioneering work in the automotive industry for nearly 20 years, and conducted in-depth thinking and effective practices in intelligent manufacturing based on its automotive manufacturing experience and internet thinking.

Tan Qingming introduced Lan-You Technology’s panoramic intelligent manufacturing architecture, which is divided into the operation, management and field layers, and can realize leanline planning, process optimization, logistics strategy optimization, production strategy optimization, intelligent analysis of production data, production site optimization, real-time monitoring optimization, etc.

To achieve optimal results, Lan-You Technology has delivered a series of intelligent manufacturing products.

Lan-You enterprise-class BOM platform: Build a product data management and application environment across the whole value chain for the enterpriseto support the efficient coordination of all sectors, from product planning and conception, to product design and engineering, then to production preparation and production, and finally to product marketing and after-sales services.

P&O production and marketing coordination system: Improve the utilization efficiency of inventory resources in terms of storage capacity and flow rate according to the sales volume plan, adjust dynamically stock-to-sales ratios and inventory levels of carmakers and sales channels , and grasp opportunities in the high and low seasons more effectively to further increase the market share.

Advanced planning and scheduling (APS) system: Realize the whole-process tracking of orders, support non-local production across multiple factories, and reduce inventory capital occupation and logistics costs while meeting delivery times.

LES intelligent logistics system: Support eight supply instruction algorithms, and configure logistics and supply modes flexibly to meet multiple logistics modes of different carmakers. In addition, its automatic identification and receiving function can reduce manual scanning work, free the hands of the operators,and make warehouse entries and exits simpler, timelier and more efficient through label and visual identification technology.

Digital manufacturing execution system (MES): It applies to vehicles, and such core parts and assemblies as engines,transmissions and battery packs, and includes plan adjustment, job instruction, production scheduling, production error-proofing, production coordination, production management and process modeling.

QMS whole-value chain quality control system: Collect and analyze existing enterprise data, and provide decision-making and management support for the whole value chain.

IIoT platform based on cloud coordination: Configure equipment networking quickly through the Nebula Ladder and Nebula T-Box soft/hard gateway products, build a unified cloud data acquisition, storage and governance platform, enable big data analysis and application, and the continual optimization of mechanism models, and establish the capacity to process massive data and develop industrial applications. The industrial app development platform and industrial micro-service component will be opened gradually to help build digital factories quickly with rich out-of-the-box industrial SaaS functions. Mature products currently available include the Nebula repair platform, motor fault diagnosis, robotic reducer predictive maintenance and motion capture application, visual recognition application, AR error-proofing application, station job instruction, timing and locating application, etc.

Intelligent manufacturing operation center (combat information center):Establish a natural information flow from the field layer to the decision-making layer, where it takes just 0.5 second to transmit information, there by truly realizing digitalization, visualization and intelligence. Give full play to bigdata analysis and intelligent decision-making through real-time monitoring,abnormity reminder and management visualization to establish an intelligent factory brain.

Individualization andremanufacturing as the future direction

Tan Qingming predicted the future direction of intelligent manufacturing based on use scenario individualization, green manufacturing and circular economy development. He thought that to better meet customer needs and support the sustainable development of mankind, intelligent manufacturing will continue to shift to“green manufacturing” along the two paths of customization and remanufacturing.

In Tan Qingming’s outlook, the future vehicle will be an intelligent mobile platform – an automatic chassis, tailored user needs in various use scenarios, plus a corresponding superstructure. This requires precise and agile development and quick delivery. Intelligent manufacturing will make a great difference in this aspect. In addition, Tan Qingming thought that used vehicle remanufacturing would be animportant direction.

Manufacturing is the foundation of a country. Building a globally competitive manufacturing industry is the only way to improve our country’s overall strength and build a strong manufacturing country, and intelligent manufacturing will be a strong impetus to the manufacturing industry.