Revisiting port performance measurement: A hybrid multi-stakeholder framework for the modelling of port performance indicators

This study develops a new port performance measurement model by taking the perspectives from different port stakeholders. The novelty lies in the modelling of interdependencies among port performance measures, and the combination of weights of interdependent measures with both qualitative and quantitative evaluations of the measures from multiple stakeholders for quantitative port performance measurement. It represents an effective performance measurement tool and offers a diagnostic instrument for performance evaluation and/or monitoring of ports and terminals so as to satisfy different requirements of various port stakeholders in a flexible manner. © 201

Developing a conceptual model for examining the supply chain relationships between behavioural antecedents of collaboration, integration and performance

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is threefold: first, review the literature on the topic of behavioural antecedents of collaboration and their impact on supply chain integration and performance; second, lay the theoretical foundations and develop a conceptual model linking behavioural antecedents of collaboration, information integration, coordination of operational decisions and supply chain performance; and third, set out operationalisation considerations. Design/methodology/approach – A conceptual model with theoretical basis on Relational Exchange Theory (RET) and extant supply chain theory is developed as a causal model that can be operationalised using structural equations modelling (partial least squares) and a “single key informant” approach. Findings – Positive relationships between behavioural antecedents of collaboration (trust, commitment, mutuality/reciprocity), information integration, coordination of operational decisions and supply chain performance (efficiency, effectiveness) are hypothesised. RET provides adequate theoretical background that leads to the theoretical establishment of hypotheses between behavioural antecedents, supply chain integration and performance, which are worth testing empirically. Research limitations/implications – The ideas presented in this paper enrich the study of behavioural factors in supply chain management and their impact on supply chain performance, and may benefit researchers in the field. The paper also sets the scene (experimental design, measurement items) for the upcoming field research. The empirical part of the work will provide the necessary evidence for the validation of the established hypotheses. Practical implications – The proposed linkages may stimulate the interest of supply chain strategists towards more collaborative relationship management and affect their decisions on the behavioural antecedents of relationship formation and management. Moreover, the proposed model may help clarify how the integration of critical operational contingencies – information, operational decisions – can help achieve superior supply chain performance. Originality/value – The paper establishes a causal relationship between constructs which have not been researched (mutuality/reciprocity, coordination of operational decisions) or have been researched individually or in combination (impact of integration on performance, impact of collaboration on performance) but not in the proposed integrated way. It also addresses the challenge of lack of theoretical justification on the development of knowledge that will assist decision making in SCM/logistics and its integration into models, processes and tasks. Finally, by using RET in selecting of behavioural factors and establishing hypotheses, it adds to the body of knowledge concerning the use of interorganisational theories in supply chain relationships

Teollisen Internetin käyttöönotto automaatiolaitteissa

Industrial Internet is a term that is used to describe digitalization of industry. It is a research direction in Finland, where there are already various groups studying it. Despite this, the term Industrial Internet is still relatively vague and there is a lack of concreteness around the topic. The objective of this thesis is to explore the current status of Industrial Internet and study the capabilities of automation devices from an Industrial Internet point of view. I explore Industrial Internet through a literary review where I study various use cases. The use cases of Industrial Internet are divided into two main types: platform centric and machine to machine (M2M) communication centric. The use cases provide a list of characteristics and requirements for Industrial Internet from these two perspectives. General requirements are, for example scalability and flexibility, which are achieved through various IT technologies, such as Service-Oriented-Architecture. This thesis also consists of a practical part where I configured the control logic and data collection for a test bed that simulates drop tests of active magnetic bearings. The control logic consists of a programmable logic controller and corresponding software. The data collection consists of software for collecting and analyzing measurement data and the measuring equipment. After the literary review and practical part, I propose the creation of a cloud based Industrial Internet platform around the active magnetic test bed. The purpose of the platform is to provide a direction for further research. The creation of the platform consists of two phases: first phase includes the creation of the platform so that the test bed achieves current functionality but cloud based. The second phase consists of changing the platform to meet the requirements of the literature review. The end results will be an application independent system solution for Industrial Internet.Teollinen Internet on termi, jolla kuvataan teollisuuden digitalisaatiota. Aihe on kasvavan kiinnostuksen kohde ja esim. Suomessa on useita tahoja, jotka panostavat aiheen tutkimukseen. Siltikin Teollinen Internet on käsitteenä epäselvä ja sitä vaivaa konkretian puute. Tämän työn tarkoituksena on tutustua Teollisen Internetin nykytilaan ja automaatiolaitteiden ominaisuuksiin Teollisen Internetin näkökulmasta. Teollisen Internetin esimerkit jakautuvat pääasiassa kahteen luokkaan: alustalähtöisiin ja koneiden väliseen kommunikaatioon (M2M-kommunikaatio). Esimerkit tarjoavat listan ominaisuuksia ja vaatimuksia Teolliselle Internetille kummastakin näkökulmasta. Yleisiä ominaisuuksia ovat esimerkiksi skaalattavuus ja joustavuus, jotka saavutetaan erilaisilla tietoteknisillä vaatimuksilla, esim. palvelukeskeisellä arkkitehtuurilla. Lisäksi työhön kuuluu käytännön osuus, jossa kirjoitin ohjainlogiikan ja datankeräyksen testilaitteeseen, joka simuloi aktiivimagneettilaakerien pudotuskokeita. Ohjainlogiikka koostui PLC-laitteesta ja siihen liittyvistä ohjelmistoista. Datan keräys koostui mittausdatan keräykseen ja purkamiseen vaadittavista ohjelmistoista sekä laitteistosta. Kirjallisuudesta kerättyjen vaatimusten ja käytännön kokemuksien perusteella esitän pilvipohjaisen, Teolliseen Internetiin suunnatun ohjelmistoalustan kehittämistä testilaitteen ympärille. Ohjelmistoalusta voi toimia yliopistollisen jatkotutkimuksen pohjana. Ohjelmistoalustan toteuttaminen tapahtuu kahdessa vaiheessa: ensimmäisessä vaiheessa kehitetään pilvipohjainen alusta, joka saavuttaa testilaitteiston nykyisen toiminnallisuuden. Toisessa vaiheessa ohjelmistoalusta muutetaan vastaamaan Teollisen Internetin vaatimuksia, jolla saavutetaan sovellusriippumaton järjestelmäratkaisu

Implementing Shop Floor IT for Industry 4.0

The fourth industrial revolution, Industry 4.0, is a paradigm shift that is currently changing our society and the way we produce things. The first industrial revolution started at the end of the 18th century and was enabled by mechanisation and steam power. The spread of electricity enabled assembly lines and mass production during the first half of the 20th century, which was the second industrial revolution. Industry 3.0 came with the invention of the computer with an increase of automation such as programmable machines and robots. The fourth revolution is upcoming and is supposed to increase productivity and flexibility to the same extent as the previous three. The idea is to utilise recent advances in information technologies and the Internet to interconnect machines, tools, equipment, sensors, and people into decentralised intelligent systems that can sense and adapt to the environment.The term Industry 4.0 was introduced 2011 by the German government as a national programme to boost research and development of the manufacturing industry. Many countries with, including Sweden, has since then started similar initiatives. The aim is to prevent further outsourcing of production to low-cost countries by improving competitiveness with increased automation and flexibility. However, the implementation is slow and many manufacturing companies have only started to computerise and are far from digitalised. There are many challenges in terms of technology, people, and organisation. Many manufacturing companies do not know how to start the process of digitalisation, they lack the knowledge and the organisation.To implement a production environment according to the Industry 4.0 vision the manufacturing organisation and its view on technologies need to change. Part of this change is to design an information technology architecture that enables interconnection of machines, equipment, tools, and people on the shop floor. The aim of this thesis is to aid decision makers in the manufacturing industry to implement a shop floor IT according to the Industry 4.0 paradigm. This was achieved with the design science approach, which means that the researcher has implemented different artefacts (technologies) that have been evaluated. The work is based on six studies that connect to real problems found in the industry today. These studies are presented and discussed with respect to three research questions: important aspects, technological implementations, and effects. Results include concrete and practical examples of how to implement IT artefacts for the shop floor. Furthermore, it highlights the complexity of the problem and shows the need for a holistic and incremental approach

Service-oriented architecture for device lifecycle support in industrial automation

Dissertação para obtenção do Grau de Doutor em Engenharia Electrotécnica e de Computadores Especialidade: Robótica e Manufactura IntegradaThis thesis addresses the device lifecycle support thematic in the scope of service oriented industrial automation domain. This domain is known for its plethora of heterogeneous equipment encompassing distinct functions, form factors, network interfaces, or I/O specifications supported by dissimilar software and hardware platforms. There is then an evident and crescent need to take every device into account and improve the agility performance during setup, control, management, monitoring and diagnosis phases. Service-oriented Architecture (SOA) paradigm is currently a widely endorsed approach for both business and enterprise systems integration. SOA concepts and technology are continuously spreading along the layers of the enterprise organization envisioning a unified interoperability solution. SOA promotes discoverability, loose coupling, abstraction, autonomy and composition of services relying on open web standards – features that can provide an important contribution to the industrial automation domain. The present work seized industrial automation device level requirements, constraints and needs to determine how and where can SOA be employed to solve some of the existent difficulties. Supported by these outcomes, a reference architecture shaped by distributed, adaptive and composable modules is proposed. This architecture will assist and ease the role of systems integrators during reengineering-related interventions throughout system lifecycle. In a converging direction, the present work also proposes a serviceoriented device model to support previous architecture vision and goals by including embedded added-value in terms of service-oriented peer-to-peer discovery and identification, configuration, management, as well as agile customization of device resources. In this context, the implementation and validation work proved not simply the feasibility and fitness of the proposed solution to two distinct test-benches but also its relevance to the expanding domain of SOA applications to support device lifecycle in the industrial automation domain

Migration from OPC Classic to OPC UA by Developing an OPC UA Client Application

Teollisuus 4.0:n eli niin sanotun neljännen teollisen vallankumouksen myötä teollisuuden laitteet ja järjestelmät kytketään verkkoon tietojen välittämistä ja yhteistoimintaa varten. Eri valmistajien laitteiden ja järjestelmien kommunikointiin tarvitaan yhtenäinen ja standardoitu tapa kuvata ja siirtää tietoa. Yksi tällaisista tavoista on OPC (Open Platform Communications). OPC on kokoelma automaation tiedonsiirron spesifikaatioita, jotka määrittävät, miten laitteiden ja järjestelmien tietoja esitetään ja välitetään. EloWise on modulaarinen tiedonhallintatyökalu, jota käytetään erilaisissa tuotannonohjauksen ja tuotteen elinkaaren hallinnan sovelluksissa. EloWise-tiedonhallintatyökaluun on toteutettu useita yleisiä tiedonsiirtoprotokollia ja -teknologioita käyttäviä moduuleja, jotka mahdollistavat EloWise-tiedonhallintatyökalun yhdistämisen ja yhteistoiminnan eri laitteiden ja järjestelmien kanssa. Aikaisemmin EloWise-tiedonhallintatyökaluun on toteutettu Elomatic Automation Interface -moduuli, joka on mahdollistanut tiedonsiirron OPC Classic -tekniikoihin kuuluvalla OPC Data Access -tekniikalla. Tämän diplomityön tavoitteena oli päivittää EloWise OPC UA -yhdistettävyyttä varten. Työn ensimmäisessä vaiheessa tehtiin kirjallisuuskatsaus OPC-tekniikoihin, menetelmiin OPC Classic -tekniikoista OPC UA:han siirtymiseen ja saatavilla oleviin OPC UA -kehitystyökaluihin ja -pinoihin. Kirjallisuuskatsauksen pohjalta valittiin EloWise-tiedonhallintatyökalun päivityksessä käytettävä menetelmä OPC Classic -tekniikasta OPC UA:han siirtymiseen. Menetelmäksi valittiin uuden OPC UA -asiakassovellusmoduulin kehitys, jotta aikaisempi toteutus ei rajoittanut kehitystä ja pystyttiin hyödyntämään kaikkia OPC UA:n ominaisuuksia. Menetelmän valinnan jälkeen vertailtiin OPC UA -kehitystyökaluja ja -pinoja asiakassovelluksen kehitystä varten. Kehitykseen valittiin Node.js -pohjainen OPC UA -toteutus, NodeOPCUA, sen riittävien toimintojen ja sallivan Massachusetts Institute of Technology -lisenssin takia. NodeOPCUA-toteutusta ja muita avoimen lähdekoodin ohjelmakirjastoja käyttäen toteutettiin OPC UA -asiakassovellusmoduuli. Toteutettu OPC UA -asiakassovellusmoduuli mahdollistaa EloWise-tiedonhallintatyökalun yhdistämisen OPC UA -palvelimiin ja sen avulla EloWise-tiedonhallintatyökalun kautta pystytään keräämään tietoja ja hallinnoimaan OPC UA-palvelimien yhteydessä olevia laitteita ja järjestelmiä. Tätä diplomityötä voidaan käyttää apuna OPC UA -asiakassovelluksen kehityksessä tai toteutettaessa OPC Classic -tekniikoista OPC UA:han siirtymist

Systematic specification of requirements for assembly process control system in the pharmaceutical industry

Abstract. Pharmaceutical manufacturing is one of the most strictly regulated fields in the world. Manufacturers of pharmaceutical products are juridically obliged to monitor the safety and quality of products. Any defects and manufacturing errors affecting the product are demanded to be traceable due to patient safety. Regulative bodies have set strict demands for data integrity in manufacturing records. The main objective of this thesis is to evaluate whether the proposed supervisory control and data acquisition software can adhere to current prevailing regulatory framework. The evaluation of the proposed supervisory control and data acquisition software focuses on handling of electronic records and electronic signatures. Features like user management, alarm and event management, reporting, and locally set requirements in the target company are investigated and reflected to the prevailing regulations concerning data integrity. The results showed that the proposed software is, when properly configured, compliant to prevailing regulations regarding electronic records and electronic signatures. In addition, the proposed software is capable of the requirements set by the target company.Systemaattinen vaatimusmäärittely kokoonpanoprosessin ohjausjärjestelmälle lääketeollisuudessa. Tiivistelmä. Valmistava lääketeollisuus on yksi maailman eniten säädellyin teollisuuden ala. Lääkinnällisten tuotteiden valmistaja on lainmukaisesti vastuussa tuotteidensa laadusta ja valmistuksen valvomisesta. Tuotteiden laatu- ja valmistusvirheiden vaaditaan olevan jäljitettävissä potilasturvallisuuden vuoksi. Sääntelyviranomaiset ovat asettaneet tiukat vaatimukset tuotantokoneiden elektronisille tallenteille. Tämän diplomityön tavoitteena on arvioida noudattaako ehdotettu ohjausjärjestelmä nykyisiä säädöksiä. Ohjausjärjestelmän arviointi keskittyy eletronisten tallenteiden ja elektronisten allekirjoitusten toteutukseen ohjelmassa. Arvioinnin perustana käytetään sääntelyviranomaisten viimeisimpiä säädöksiä. Arviointi kohdistuu ohjelmiston käyttähallintaan, hälytys- ja tapahtumahallintaan, raportointiin ja paikallisesti asetettuihin vaatimuksiin tiedon eheyden näkökulmasta. Arviointi osoitti, että oikein konfiguroituna ehdotettu ohjausjärjestelmä noudattaa nykyisiä säännöksiä elektronisten tallenteiden ja elektronisten allekirjoitusten osalta. Ohjelmisto pystyy myös vastaamaan yrityksen paikallisesti asetettuihin vaatimuksiin. Ohjelmistoa voi kuitenkin käyttää vastoin nykyisiä sääntelyviranomaisten laatimia säädöksiä ilman riittävää asiantuntevuutta

Effectiveness of OPC for systems integration in the process control information architecture

A Process is defined as the progression to some particular end or objective through a logical and orderly sequence of events. Various devices (e.g., actuators, limit switches, motors, sensors, etc.) play a significant role in making sure that the process attains its objective (e.g., maintaining the furnace temperature within an acceptable limit). To do these things effectively, manufacturers need to access data from the plant floor or devices and integrate those into their control applications, which maybe one of the off the shelf tools such as Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA), Distributed Control System (DCS), or Programmable Logic Controllers (PLC). A number of vendors have devised their own Data Acquisition Networks or Process Control Architectures (e.g., PROFIBUS, DEVICENET, INTERBUS, ETHERNET I/P, etc.) that claim to be open to or interoperable with a number of third party devices or products that make process data available to the Process or Business Management level. In reality this is far from what it is claimed to be. Due to the problem of interoperability, a manufacturer is forced to be bound, either with the solutions provided by a single vendor or with the writing of a driver for each hardware device that is accessed by a process application. Today\u27s manufacturers are looking for advanced distributed object technologies that allow for seamless exchange of information across plant networks as a means of integrating the islands of automation that exist in their manufacturing operations. OLE for Process Control (OPC) works to significantly reduce the time, cost, and effort required in writing custom interfaces for hundreds of different intelligent devices and networks in use today. The objective of this thesis is to explore the OLE for Process Control (OPC) technology in depth by highlighting its need in industry and by using the OPC technology in an application in which data from a process controlled by Siemens Simatic S7 PLC are shared with a client application running in LabVTEW6i