Micro Operations Management (µOM) via networked Asset Administration Shells, OPC UA, and MQTT

The lecturer of Global Master's in Internet of Things (IoT) and electrical engineering and electronics expert, Klaus Landsdorf shares in this blog article how B2MML infrastructures can change to Micro operations Management (µOM) architecture and help the companies to build an IIoT of a decentralized operations management. The first round of Industry 4.0 research was until 2020. Now we are in the second round of the next generation of manufacturing development with the new decade of the “Vision Manufacturing 2030”. In this context, B2MML hardly receives any attention, although already in 2016, more than 60% showed interoperability.Let’s start with the Business To Manufacturing Markup Language (B2MML). B2MML is more than 60% in use for interoperability in business to manufacturing. B2MML infrastructures can change next to Micro Operations Management (µOM) architecture and can help to build an IoT with decentralized operations management. From that point to start the business and the manufacturing processes are integrated from the very beginning. An operation in management is for example the production, maintenance, quality-checking, work, and inventory see IEC-62264 or ISA-95. Figure 1 shows the simplified vision to build a decentralized IoT Manufacturing Operations Management (MOM) for the future based on the Asset Administration Shell (AAS) and IEC-62264 to support the Digital-Twin concept and the Make, Monitor, Analyze, and Adjust (M2A2) life-cycle process of the RAMI4.0 (IEC PAS 63088).With µOM, integrated as ISA-95 or AutomationML (AML) submodels within the AAS, a service can provide APIs via OPC UA and/or MQTT for systems with for example Artificial Intelligence (AI) to enhance the µOM with intelligence in a decoupled architecture. Each vendor of service can work independently as long as the API is still working. That “loosely coupled” architecture in software systems is possible if the service can use references to organize their linking. AAS allows references to link with other services. The references make it easier to add, change and remove external services for the AAS. The µOM uses references internal and external to handle the process linking and “loosely coupled” interoperability.Sounds like too much theory? But, with RAMI4.0 and the usage of the IEC-62264 in the “Life Cycle Value Stream” and “Hierarchy Levels” axes it isn’t just theory. It is existing and it is defined as an industry standard by IEC. OPC UA working groups defined or defining the information models per industry, which helps to understand each other in IoT communication. With MQTT integration into OPC UA, ECLASS descriptions, and B2MML XML/JSON, the next steps can be done soon to build µOM for the IoT to develop solutions for the “Vision Manufacturing 2030”.

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Klaus Landsdorf Professor of the Global Master's in Internet of Things (IoT) Managing Partner at Iniationware GmbH