Siemens Zhu Xiaoxun: Digital Transformation Decentralizes IT and OT

Zhu Xiaoxun

General Manager of Siemens Aventis China

President of Siemens China Research Institute

On September 1, Zhu Xiaoxun, General Manager of Siemens Aventis China and President of Siemens China Research Institute, attended one of the activities of the 2022 China International Fair for Trade in Services (“Service Fair”) – “2022 China Smart Industry”. Forum” and delivered a speech on the topic of enterprise digital transformation.

Zhu Xiaoxun said in his speech that in the era of Industry 2.0, enterprises mainly solve quality problems through processes, and the second change based on Industry 2.0 is the change of automation and informatization, that is, the original manual process is solidified into software through computer technology. In addition to improving efficiency, it can also ensure that people will not make mistakes. Industry 3.0 is more about centralized control, using software to ensure that factories operate according to established procedures. With Industry 4.0, that is, the transformation driven by digital technology, the process-driven software control mode of the original pyramid structure has changed. Due to the flexible secondary development requirements of production operations, the requirements for the entire software architecture will become more and more flat. It is scenario-driven, which is the core of digital transformation. Therefore, automation and informatization are not the purpose of digital transformation. Digital transformation must be decentralized, and a flat architecture should be used to bridge the barriers between IT and OT. The core here is data, how to promote value generation through data and scenarios, and how to make production more flexible and flatter.

The digital transformation of enterprises can not only talk about technology, first of all, it is necessary to understand the value transformation of enterprises. All value chains within a manufacturing enterprise will intersect with product production, which are mainly divided into three categories: the first is a set of value chains that run through the product life cycle, including product design, engineering, production, and later product quality traceability, etc. , to realize the connection and interaction of data. The second value chain is the asset operation value chain. From planning new production lines, purchasing equipment, and equipment maintenance, to ensuring the continuous operation of production lines through data collection, these are a value chain that invests in factory hardware. The third value chain is the business performance value chain, which mainly refers to the acquisition of customer orders, the acquisition of products, and the feedback of logistics and product quality. These three value chains focus on production and constitute the core activities of the enterprise.

Therefore, if manufacturing enterprises want to promote digitalization, the core need to solve the problem of digitalization of various value chains in the production process is to do a good job in digitalization of production and open up the data islands in the enterprise to become an activity that can truly generate value through data, and this At times, it is necessary to open up data across the value chain. Therefore, digital technology based on enterprise digital twins and modeling and simulation has become a powerful tool that can help enterprises open up data islands across value chains. Digital twins can first help sort out business knowledge and consolidate knowledge in knowledge graphs, and then help enterprise data modeling through knowledge graphs. The modeled IT and OT data can be connected, and a large amount of computing power can be used to provide optimal solutions. Operation strategy, and optimize the operation strategy from a scenario-driven perspective, and finally implement it. In addition, if any enterprise wants to transform, it must also pay attention to the improvement of culture, organization and talent capabilities. Organizational flattening and talent digitization will be an important driving force for promoting the digital transformation of enterprises.