References

Pharmatec GmbH

The support of the Industrial App now saves the user many ways around the machine.

The project investigated the possibilities of new interactions between human and machine based on Industrial Apps. A prototype of a new input mask for use on Android tablets was designed, implemented with the Workbench and the ProcessHub of the MONKEY WORKS Suite and presented at ACHEMA 2015. The Industrial App obtains data from Siemens controllers via the S7 protocol and via OPC UA from controllers made by other manufacturers. In the app itself, a dashboard shows essential characteristics at first glance and helps the operator to find his way around the operating and service processes. Extensive video material was embedded for the trade fair presentation.

Furthermore, an industrial app was prototypically developed. It supports the user in fulfilling an action sequence that recurs several times a day. Up to now, this operation has been depicted on the locally installed HMI. The support of the Industrial App now saves the user many ways around the machine. Process control and confirmation of the work steps can now take place directly where the technicians work is located.

sab Burkhardt GmbH

[...] to prepare our customers for the next generation of machine operation and visualization.

So far, we have cooperated with the software team of ELCO Industrie Automation GmbH, formerly MONKEY WORKS GmbH, within the project of an app development for our company. The objective of the app development was the direct communication of an Android tablet with an industrial control through WiFi and through the protocol OPC UA. The app was developed by sab Burkhardt with the MONKEY WORKS Suite and is supposed to support our employees productively during the commissioning of new plants and during support requests on existing plants on site at the customer’s location. In order not to need an individually developed app for each plant, one of the main requirements for the app development with the MONKEY WORKS Suite was that the connection to the OPC UA server of the control would only be established after the correct IP address was entered on the start page of the app. On the control’s side sab Burkhardt GmbH developed a module for TIA V14, which generates standardized data values (similar to PackML). The access to the output value of the module is provided afterwards via OPC UA. This module is integrated into new and existing projects and will be connected with available data of the application program.

The task to read the data values directly from the app via OPC UA was approached very quickly by the ELCO software team after a joint meeting. The team of ELCO stood out especially due its short and quick communication channels. In all developments one encounters obstacles and stumbling blocks. The way how problems are dealt with here is crucial. ELCO presented itself very professionally and customer-oriented.

As a result, we now have an Android-App, with which we can access different controls by entering the corresponding IP address. Thus, allowing us quick access to the system status, fault messages and many other information on site in the whole plant environment.

After the joint development we also see the chance for our customers to improve the productivity of their plants by using mobile apps. Unnecessary downtimes, which for example are caused by missing material, can be reduced by notifying personnel. Error messages can also be reacted to faster by receiving specific notifications. Therefore, we are interested in a close cooperation with the team of Elco Industrie Automation GmbH to prepare our customers for the next generation of machine operation and visualization.

Joschka Burkhardt
Managing Director

Lausitz Energie Bergbau AG

Planning and execution of a study for the introduction of an Android-based solution in mining.

Since 2007, Lausitz Energie Bergbau AG (LEAG) has been gathering valuable experience with a mobile PDA solution to simplify the commissioning, configuration and maintenance of filter wells for groundwater regulation. A study was carried out together with Elco Industrie Automation GmbH to design an adequate successor, which involved the users from the beginning. The future users gave their feedback on each individual step - from the collection of requirements to the conception and implementation - and were even able to help shape the next step.
This level of co-determination ensured that the new solution was accepted from the beginning. "When can we finally use the new apps?", "We still want this and that feature." or "Can't we also digitize this or that work step with an app?" In this respect, the study was a complete success, because the users now work with tools that were made with them for them.
The solution was iteratively implemented as a native industrial app with the tools of the MONKEY WORKS Suite from Elco Industrie Automation GmbH to accompany the study. Feedback was regularly obtained on development statuses and alternative concepts were also experimented with. The users have always decided how something has to be designed and what information is required at what time. With the MONKEY WORKS Suite, the requirements and change requests were always implemented quickly - from prototype to productive industrial app.

A&C Automationssysteme & Consulting GmbH

In ELCO we see a reliable and strong partner for coping with the future challenges of our customers.

The cooperation with the ELCO experts is a significant gain for A&C regarding the implementation of our Industry 4.0 and digitization strategy. In our automation and consulting projects, this also benefits our customers: The tools from ELCO make it a piece of cake for us to implement Industrial Apps for new use cases as well as for retrofit scenarios quickly and safely.

The aim of our partnership is therefore to jointly make Industrial Apps accessible to a broader user base as a beneficial supplement in machine and plant construction and to consolidate and further expand their position in the market. The focus is on the exchange between us, A&C, which is strongly rooted in the industry, and ELCO, the expert for apps in the industry.

In addition, A&C handles the entire distribution of the MONKEY WORKS Suite in Austria, Slovenia and Croatia.

In ELCO we see a reliable and strong partner for coping with the future challenges of our customers.

Michael Göbl
Managing Director, COO

SYS TEC electronic AG

Specialized know-how, openness and a common goal are the high-quality synergy of the partnership.

The hardware and software solutions from SYS TEC electronic are the basis of a powerful edge level, including the connection of fieldbuses and the pre-processing and compression of data. Finally, ELCO ‘s IoTHub is used for cross-location and cross-system networking of production data and determination of key figures. We are thus able to serve the entire IIoT layer model technologically and thus not only offer our customers holistic solutions, but also implement new applications.

In order to demonstrate the added value of the two companies in detail using an example, we set up a demo at sps ipc drives from 27 to 29 November 2018. It described an automated and networked candy factory. The booths of ELCO Industrie Automation and SYS TEC electronic presented different candy factories that were networked with each other. The demo showed customers how they can network machines, automate processes and centrally evaluate a wide variety of data using technologies from the Industrial Internet of Things.

SYS TEC electronic and ELCO Industrie Automation have set themselves the task of homogenizing data from a wide variety of sources and making it available to other systems for further processing. Specialized know-how, openness and a common goal are the high-quality synergy of the partnership.

Joint customers benefit from a convincing unit for the IIoT: the IoT-Edge-Controller sysWORXX CTR-700 from SYS TEC electronic with the IoTHub from ELCO.

Nadine Mensdorf
Head of Sales and Product Management

3INCLOUD

Joint project: Industrial Internet Platform and Industrial Internet Operating System

In this project together with the Industrial Internet Innovation Center Shanghai an Industrial Internet platform will be implemented, to which various devices like industrial controls and IoT-Devices can be adapted. Industrial controls of different manufactures (Siemens, Mitsubishi) and different transfer protocols (S7, ModbusTCP, OPC UA, etc.) will be supported. The IoT devices by ELCO will be deployed mainly, but through a public API the data of the other manufactures can be also received.

The heterogeneous data of the various devices are homogenized in the ELCO IoTHub and fed to the Analytics Engine Thingswise. Here the data are examining for anomalies and other characteristic values.

The ELCO IoTHub builds the data hub in the project. All devices are managed by the IoTHub, their data is received and provided by other systems according to the rules. The information of the other systems is allocated to the according registered devices.

KoMMDia

In the project, an interactive assistance system for fault diagnosis is designed, implemented and evaluated.

"Collaborative project: Cooperative human-machine dialogues in the diagnosis and elimination of disturbances in processing plants (Origin of the title “KoMMDia” in german)".

In the project, an interactive assistance system for fault diagnosis is designed, implemented and evaluated. The assistance system enables the operator to use the data collected by machines as a basis for information. Further the operator can correct the data and supplement it with their own knowledge. Hence the assistance system requests information from the operator step by step, integrates it with the machine data and reports the results back to the operator.

The project will be carried out in cooperation with the Fraunhofer Gesellschaft für angewandte Forschung e.V. (Fraunhofer IVV Dresden), the Technische Universität Dresden (Chair of Engineering Psychology and Applied Cognition Research and the Chair of Process Control), Theegarten-Pactec GmbH & Co. KG, August Storck AG and JR Die Schokoladenfabrik GmbH as application partners. The main project contents of ELCO Industrie Automation GmbH are the aggregation of data from different data sources and the requirements of machine learning algorithms. Data is provided to the project partners via universal interfaces containing OPC UA. ELCO continues to support the implementation of the human-machine interface based on industrial apps. In close cooperation with the Chair of Engineering Psychology and Applied Cognitive Research, various technology concepts will be investigated.

The project started in January 2018 and will end in mid-2020 and is funded by the Federal Office of Education and Research.

OPC Foundation

The active cooperation in the OPC Foundation is a logical consequence of our requirements to serve you as a customer or partner with the best possible products.

We have been a member of the OPC Foundation since February 2018. This allows us early access to important resources for the development of reliable and powerful OPC products.

Not only our Industrial Apps and the ProcessHub provide native support for OPC UA, but also our new IoTHub. We even go one step further and provide all IoT data via an OPC UA server interface.

The active cooperation in the OPC Foundation is a logical consequence of our requirements to serve you as a customer or partner with the best possible products.

Projekt Smart Rain

Aufbau eines Monitoring-Netzwerks für lokale Niederschlagsmessungen in der Landeshauptstadt Dresden

Together with the TU Dresden (Chair of Geoinformatics) and the IT Startup PIKOBYTES ELCO Industrie Automation GmbH is developing a monitoring network for the local precipitation measurement in Dresden withing the framework of the project Smart Rain, which is funded by the Landeshauptstadt Dresden.

The project is dedicated to building and operating a highly compacted precipitation measurement network for urban areas. The aim of the monitoring network is to gather information about local heavy rain events and special urban climate characteristics. This information will be available for different actors of the city and infrastructure planning. The monitoring network is planned as a civic network to find out which technical and organizational challenges need to be overcome for the operation. This includes long term operating costs, maintenance costs, supervision expenditures or the resulting quality of data.

The project is expected to start in July 2018 and runs until the end of 2019. The recorded measurements and construcion plans will be publicly available as OpenData/OpenHardware and can be reproduced by interested citizens, makers and crowd sourcing projects.