这是一个简单的演示：一个小的库卡工业机器人将乐高零件组装成乐高的颜色和配置的人。What was unusual about the demo—performed at Sapphire ‘03, the SAP AG customer conference last month in Orlando, Fla.—was that the robot was assembling the products into differing configurations based on “customer orders” being entered through a Web site on a nearby personal computer.
在真实的情况下，这样的系统可以利用SAP，巨型企业软件供应商SAP提供的许多标准软件模块。After accepting a consumer’s online order through the mySAP Enterprise Portal using SAP’s “product configurator,” SAP software could calculate pricing based on the customer-selected product configuration, enter the order in the financial system, assemble a bill of materials and make appropriate inventory adjustments, among other functions linked to SAP databases. What is not standard, however, is the ability to link SAP business and financial applications to a robot or other factory floor equipment to drive the assembly of a customer-selected product configuration.
虽然一些公司目前直接从在线订单推动生产，但他们的系统通常基于昂贵的自定义软件开发，即加利福尼亚州SAP实验室，制造业和分销高级副总裁，制造业和分销，加利福尼亚州的SAP Labs，SAP最近开始与SAP开始使用German-based Kuka—and intends to work with other automation equipment vendors—in hopes of developing a standardized set of interfaces to link SAP’s enterprise systems to factory automation equipment, says Herzberg.
“您希望能够与工厂楼层的各种机器接口，”Herzberg Notes。“一旦道路规则很清楚，我们打算为标准，预先包装的软件提供解决方案，”他说。
然而，Herzberg在可以实现这些标准时不会为这些标准设置时的时间表。“这必须是一个协作过程，我们不在驾驶员座位上，”他观察。“在自动化设备供应商上的客户可能需要一些压力，以便得到解决这种情况。”
救命，我正在突破
Herzberg指出，此类企业到工厂接口在实现时，可用于在两个方向上移动数据。“这不仅仅是关于将数据发送到机器，而且还可以从机器获取关于它正在执行的制造过程的数据，或者是在执行的制造过程中，”他说。“未来的机器实际上会告诉系统他们正在崩溃。”
虽然这种通知不是今天SAP系统的例程，但它在作品中，确认了DAGMAR FISCHER-NEEB，他在SAPPIRE会议上宣布的新成立的业务部门。除此之外，SAP正在与一家名为SmartSignal的公司合作，用于航空航天行业的系统，其中机器监控数据可以发送给SAP后端软件，以便在Fischer -Neeb中说明使用计划计划的维护活动。
SmartSignal, Lisl四岁的公司e, Ill., provides software for analyzing large volumes of sensor and equipment data that the company says can be used to reveal problems and predict breakdowns well ahead of the fact. The SmartSignal software is based on technology developed originally at Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne, Ill., for use in the nuclear power industry, but is now being extended for use in other asset-intensive industries.
