5G-SMART has made an important contribution to better understanding the needs of the manufacturing sector with respect to 5G, with the exploration and analysis of both trialed use cases as well as additional six forward-looking smart manufacturing use cases. The analysis of the requirements and KPIs of the use cases clearly showed the need of a reliable, low-latency, high-performance wireless infrastructure in factories of the future.
While this wireless infrastructure is recognized to play a decisive role, uncertainty is still inhibiting investments so far. The main reason is that a comprehensive framework is missing to quantify potential improvements and allow an economic evaluation of 5G-enabled benefits for specific use cases from an end-user perspective. In an attempt to fill this gap, 5G-SMART has developed an assessment framework to quantify the business value of 5G for industry applications.
Furthermore, with respect to business models, 5G-SMART has contributed to a wider understanding of the different strengths and weaknesses of service providers and how different deployment options fit some scenarios better than others.
5G-SMART has identified, analyzed and discussed different radio network deployment options for smart manufacturing, aiming at providing an overview for any desired industrial 5G scenario or service. A wide range of system-level simulation studies has been performed that assess the technical performance of the identified deployment scenarios.
The three industry field trials designed and developed within the project are a key achievement and the basis for the evaluation, validation and demonstration of 5G for industrial use cases. At the Kista trial site, 5G capabilities for 5G enhanced industrial robotics have been investigated. The results show e.g. the feasibility of moving high-level robot control functionality to en edge-cloud node, while running communication over 5G. At the Aachen trial site, 5G for enhanced industrial manufacturing processes has been in the focus. Here, an acoustic emission (AE) sensor has been developed and integrated into a machine, to monitor the condition of cutting tools. In a second use case a 5G versatile multi-sensor platform (MSP) has been developed allowing to measure or sense many diverse physical quantities across the factory floor. The results show that both the AE system and the MSP can be realized via 5G. At the Reutlingen trial site, 5G has been validated in a Bosch semiconductor factory environment from two different perspectives. First, 5G radio propagation in the production environment and electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) and second, 5G has been validated on the application-level, by realizing a cloud-based mobile robotics use case and a Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN)/Industrial Local Area Network (LAN) over 5G use case. All 3 testbeds have become endorsed by 5G-ACIA.
Apart from KPIs for evaluating 5G performance, 5G-SMART has also analyzed industrial-focused KPIs by evaluating the impact of the use cases on seven industry goals: quality, mobility, safety, flexibility, productivity, utilization, and sustainability.
Going beyond the trials, 5G-SMART has looked into aspects on 5G optimization for smart manufacturing. The project focused on: Advanced 5G technical features, novel 5G network architecture options and an industrial-centric network management of the 5G system.
The 5G advanced technical features considered are: 5G-TSN integration, 5G-based positioning, and time synchronization.
On the topic of novel 5G network architecture options, the work by 5G-SMART covers an in-depth investigation of device to edge cloud aspects for several non-public network deployment models, in order to allow the adoption of cloud technologies for industrial applications. In addition, systematic investigations a framework was proposed for a systematic analysis of different NPN operation models.
Concerning the Edge cloud architecture, an extensive analysis of different Edge cloud integration options with NPN deployment models was performed. The investigation showed how the 5G system with URLLC features, TSN support and integration with Edge cloud can provide E2E deterministic communication services for a wide range of smart manufacturing use cases.
Along with architectural and technical features, it is important to align the 5G network management with existing network management and industrial applications. 5G-SMART has developed an industrial centric network management framework which helps industrial application and network management solutions to leverage functionality of the 5G system in a simplified manner.
