The European Factory Platform project (EFPF) realises a federated smart factory ecosystem by primarily interlinking 4 smart factory platforms, from the FoF-11-2016 cluster, through an open and interoperable Data Spine.
The federation of the 4 base platforms is complemented by industrial platforms, collaboration tools and smart factory systems, specifically selected to support connected factories in lot-size-one manufacturing. The federated EFPF platform delivers enhances value and reduces the barrier to innovation by providing seamless access to services and solutions that are currently dispersed.
In parallel the platform provides the necessary infrastructure, tools and support for novel service creation and validations by third parties. Further, by fostering healthy competition in the smart factory ecosystem, the EFPF platform will ensure that the needs of the evolving smart manufacturing industry are met for the long term.
The EFPF federation is offered to the manufacturing and logistic companies as an open platform; to utilise the offered functionality, experiment with innovation approaches and develop custom solutions based on specific needs. The project demonstrates the power of federation through 3 embedded large scale pilots focusing on lot-size-one manufacturing and sustainable value networks in diverse sectors, while a cross sectorial circular economy pilot is also incorporated.
The results of the pilots are openly made available as lessons learned and best practices. The creation of the European smart factory ecosystem is supported by offering interested companies technical and financial support. A dedicated budget is allocated to offer financial support to companies who are interested in using the eFactory platform to enhance their businesses.
The project is primarily composed of SMEs who have the agility to quickly react and adopt innovative solutions, while experience and market reach of big players such as Siemens is also leveraged.
Associated to EPFP Reference Architecture: Process data management Details: Implemented for the realisation of data intensive industrial processes.
Web resources: |
https://www.efpf.org/
https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/825075 https://www.youtube.com/@EFPFH - You Tube channel |
Start date: | 01-01-2019 |
End date: | 31-12-2022 |
Total budget - Public funding: | 13 640 264,00 Euro - 13 640 264,00 Euro |
Twitter: | @EFPFproject |
Original description
The EFPF project realises a federated smart factory ecosystem by primarily interlinking 4 smart factory platforms, from the FoF-11-2016 cluster, through an open and interoperable Data Spine. The federation of the 4 base platforms is complemented by industrial platforms, collaboration tools and smart factory systems, specifically selected to support connected factories in lot-size-one manufacturing. The federated EFPF platform delivers enhances value and reduces the barrier to innovation by providing seamless access to services and solutions that are currently dispersed. In parallel the platform provides the necessary infrastructure, tools and support for novel service creation and validations by third parties. Further, by fostering healthy competition in the smart factory ecosystem, the EFPF platform will ensure that the needs of the evolving smart manufacturing industry are met for the long term. The EFPF federation is offered to the manufacturing and logistic companies as an open platform; to utilise the offered functionality, experiment with innovation approaches and develop custom solutions based on specific needs. The project demonstrates the power of federation through 3 embedded large scale pilots focusing on lot-size-one manufacturing and sustainable value networks in diverse sectors, while a cross sectorial circular economy pilot is also incorporated. The results of the pilots are openly made available as lessons learned and best practices. The creation of the European smart factory ecosystem is supported by offering interested companies technical and financial support. A dedicated budget is allocated to offer financial support to companies who are interested in using the EFPF platform to enhance their businesses. The project is primarily composed of SMEs who have the agility to quickly react and adopt innovative solutions, while experience and market reach of big players such Siemens and others is also leveraged.Status
SIGNEDCall topic
DT-ICT-07-2018-2019Update Date
27-10-2022The EFPF project has undertaken standardization activities during its implementation in order to promote interoperability and support the development of new standards. Some of the specific standardization activities that were developed include drafting of documents for the CWA (common workshop agreement) 'European connected factory platform for agile manufacturing interoperability (EFPFInterOp)', which are listed in a dedicated project deliverable. The project did not encounter any significant risks or difficulties related to standardization activities, as the NSB (project partner) applied sound risk management and provided clear guidance on how to mitigate any potential risks.
After the project's completion, the partners will continue to promote the CWA and the standard way of establishing federated platforms. Additionally, the project has produced deliverables such as the CWAs developed by the CEN-CENELEC workshop EFPFInterOp.
To strengthen the links between research, innovation, and standardization in the future, it is important to raise awareness of existing standards. This can be done by making more people aware of the standards that are currently in place and reminding them that the standardization process is ongoing. Additionally, encouraging more collaborations between research, innovation and standardization organizations in order to promote research and innovation in a standard-compliant way can also be beneficial.
The project has shown how to integrate the architectural features of several platforms, and how to facilitate cross-platform business activities. The interoperable Data Spine is already constructed and will shortly be verified. By offering tools for data sharing, intelligence exchange, and process optimisation, the project increases the agility of the targeted value networks. A comprehensive federated platform is created by combining the traits of current platforms. Using the open-call mechanism, The Data Spine gives the federated platform an extensible component that enables the integration of other platforms and collaborative tools to be provided through a unified user experience. An ideal alignment between the EFPF tools and relevant standards is made possible by participation in standardisation committees developing standards for strategic areas, but it must be continually evaluated and updated. By participating in strategic standardisation groups, EFPF becomes more visible to important stakeholders and has easier access to information that is directly relevant to the project. The idea of a CEN Workshop Agreement as a deliverable for standardisation has directly benefited EFPF as an ecosystem of digital platforms.
Associated to EPFP Reference Architecture: Process data management Details: Implemented for the realisation of data intensive industrial processes.
EFPF ensured that the Factory platform complies with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Aligning project objectives and activities with existing laws and standards is a crucial component of EFPF. In order to ease data sharing and standardisation procedures, it also engages in significant engagements with national and European regulation and standardisation organisations on smart industrial automation, data processing, and analytics. The question of which of the increasingly overlapping standards to use as a reference for every particular platform solution confronts researchers and technicians at EFPF. This is a typical issue in any field where standards are in conflict or overlap.
The strategy used by EFPF is to closely monitor the development of various standardisation initiatives. With the assistance of experts (like ASI, a core partner of EFPF), RTD activities are aligned with ongoing standardisation activities with the goal of adopting existing standards and, when possible, contributing to their development. Based on the nature of technical activities in WP3 to WP7, the following aspects of EFPF are considered relevant to the ongoing standardisation and regulation activities:
- Connecting multiple digital manufacturing tools, services and platforms through APIs and service interfaces to realise a federated platform;
- Exchange of data by the diverse tools, systems and platforms that need to be federated through the Data Spine;
- Establishing interconnectivity and interoperability to most widely used industrial data exchange standards and systems;
- Smart contracting in agile value networks through the use of blockchain technology;
- Security and privacy of information exchanged between partners in collaboration and also, the information exchanged through the platform;
- Linkage and interoperability of commonly used security protocols; and
- The use of Cloud services for storage and marketplace solutions.
The EFPF project has undertaken standardization activities during its implementation in order to promote interoperability and support the development of new standards. Some of the specific standardization activities that were developed include drafting of documents for the CWA (common workshop agreement) 'European connected factory platform for agile manufacturing interoperability (EFPFInterOp)', which are listed in a dedicated project deliverable. The project did not encounter any significant risks or difficulties related to standardization activities, as the NSB (project partner) applied sound risk management and provided clear guidance on how to mitigate any potential risks.
After the project's completion, the partners will continue to promote the CWA and the standard way of establishing federated platforms. Additionally, the project has produced deliverables such as the CWAs developed by the CEN-CENELEC workshop EFPFInterOp.
To strengthen the links between research, innovation, and standardization in the future, it is important to raise awareness of existing standards. This can be done by making more people aware of the standards that are currently in place and reminding them that the standardization process is ongoing. Additionally, encouraging more collaborations between research, innovation and standardization organizations in order to promote research and innovation in a standard-compliant way can also be beneficial.
The project has shown how to integrate the architectural features of several platforms, and how to facilitate cross-platform business activities. The interoperable Data Spine is already constructed and will shortly be verified. By offering tools for data sharing, intelligence exchange, and process optimisation, the project increases the agility of the targeted value networks. A comprehensive federated platform is created by combining the traits of current platforms. Using the open-call mechanism, The Data Spine gives the federated platform an extensible component that enables the integration of other platforms and collaborative tools to be provided through a unified user experience. An ideal alignment between the EFPF tools and relevant standards is made possible by participation in standardisation committees developing standards for strategic areas, but it must be continually evaluated and updated. By participating in strategic standardisation groups, EFPF becomes more visible to important stakeholders and has easier access to information that is directly relevant to the project. The idea of a CEN Workshop Agreement as a deliverable for standardisation has directly benefited EFPF as an ecosystem of digital platforms.