Methodology for the Retrofitting of Manufacturing Resources for Migration of SME Towards Industry 4.0

Abstract

Small and medium enterprises (SMEs) represent one of the main forces in economic development and employment generation. It is expected that these SMEs can turn towards new manufacturing paradigms such as Industry 4.0 to ensure their competitiveness in a future market. Nevertheless, these companies regard Industry 4.0 more as a challenge rather than a chance or as enabler for new value added opportunities. For this reason, in this article a literature review of Industry 4.0 officials reports and standards is carried out, in order to define a step by step the procedure of manufacturing resources migration towards Industry 4.0 by means of digital retrofitting, specifying both hardware and software requirements, the systems structure and required technology mapping for the Industry 4.0 implementation over traditional manufacturing resources. The main objective is to obtain the benefits of applying the Industry 4.0 paradigm without incurring in huge investments and provide technologic tools to SMEs that allow them to participate in globalized markets. Finally, the proposed methodology is applied in the retrofitting of a CNC machine given as result an industry 4.0 component ready to be integrated on a high-level application.