Companies invest 30% more in the last year to adapt to Industry 4.0 with the support of TECNALIA

29 May 2018. For more than a decade now, TECNALIA, Europe's leading research and technological development centre for advanced manufacturing solutions, has implemented real 4.0 technologies in companies to boost their competitiveness through digitalisation and thus anticipate the new Industry 4.0 model, which focuses on data and the intelligent integration of ICT into the market.

The speed at which this new industry is advancing has led to it increasing its activity with companies deploying Industry 4.0 in the last year by more than 30%, both in terms of income and the number of projects. In doing so, it currently collaborates with more than a hundred industrial companies, 70% of them SMEs, in R&D projects related to digital transformation, which has led to a turnover for TECNALIA of 50 million euros in the last two years.

At the 30th edition of BIEMH, TECNALIA is showcasing innovations and technologies that it is leading in the field of digitalisation, developed entirely with companies to achieve zero-defect products, increase process efficiency, optimise the consumption of materials and energy and maximise safety in industrial environments. To this end, the company has brought its trends in the digitalisation of industry to a 4.0 stand: data monitoring and analysis, 4.0 maintenance of industrial assets and their components, artificial vision, visualisation of “digital twins”, secure data traceability and flexible robotics.

The TECNALIA stand at the Biennial Exhibition has four different areas: the first one represents the “real” working environment of a 4.0 factory and its “digital twin”; the second one, the star, is 3D manufacturing; the third one is dedicated to companies, which have a tool to design their 4.0 strategy; and the fourth one revolves around the training and profiles that Industry 4.0 needs.

The digital factory

TECNALIA has reproduced a digital factory at the Biennial Exhibition and simulated a “real” working environment in which up to four robots collaborate to create, select and assemble automotive and aeronautic parts. The entire process has its own “digital twin”, a digital representation of a process or product, which digitally and faithfully reproduces the behaviour and performance of its real version. It works by sending permanent feedback with information on its respective environments (actual physical and optimal digital environments), enabling a fast and effective evolution towards versions with zero defects that are more efficient and better adapted to their environment. At the Biennial, you can interact with the digital factory through screens and virtual reality glasses.

The four robots in this digital factory represent different advanced key processes for Industry 4.0, which have been developed and implemented in companies such as Aernnova, Fagor Arrasate and Airbus.

New 3D machines with ADDILAN

The stand also has a space reserved for additive manufacturing, one of today’s most pioneering technologies in which the research and technological development centre has been immersed for more than 10 years. Now it has taken a further step forward and joined the newly created company ADDILAN to accelerate the technological development of the new 3D machine concept designed by ADDILAN, which will make it possible to duplicate the productivity of industrial sectors. These machines are based on the development of WAAM technology, which makes it possible to manufacture larger parts while using less raw materials and with shorter manufacturing times.

The Biennial is witness to this new technology and the parts that it creates, designed for the market from medium to large size components in industrial sectors such as aeronautics, aerospace, energy and naval, through an innovative mise en scène: the “digital twin” of the machine in the form of a hologram makes it possible to visualise the internal composition of the machine and its operation in real time.

4.0 strategy for companies

To the third of its areas, TECNALIA has brought its tool for collaborating with companies in the design of their 4.0 strategy, a diagnostic model that allows them to visualise the opportunity that Industry 4.0 represents for improving their productivity and business. In this way, by means of an application, companies themselves will be able to find out how to adapt their supply to demand, how to optimise their consumption in production or how to maximise the quality of the product and the health of the environment. Through this analysis, TECNALIA assists companies in defining and implementing the most suitable strategy for their adaptation to the 4.0 paradigms. Since 2015, it has carried out personalised diagnoses of more than 120 industrial companies, 80% of them SMEs.

4.0 people and profiles

TECNALIA completes its 4.0 deployment with an area dedicated to new profiles for the digital industry. To this end, a video starring people on a real scale presents its ability to be a bridge between industry and training centres, helping to train the profiles required by industry. In this regard, TECNALIA has launched two postgraduate degrees at the University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU) in collaboration with the Machine Tool Institute (IMH): a Master's Degree in Digital Manufacturing and a Specialist Master's Degree in Predictive Data Analysis Projects for Industry 4.0.

About TECNALIA

TECNALIA is a leading Research and Technological Development Centre in Europe, with 1,400 experts representing 30 different nationalities, focusing on transforming technology into GDP to improve people's quality of life, by creating business opportunities for companies. www.tecnalia.com