Model similarity evidence and interoperability affinity in cloud-ready Industry 4.0 technologies

Cloud computing is revolutionizing IT environments in most fields of economy. Its service-based approach enables collaboration and data exchange on higher level, with better efficiency and parallel decreasing costs. Also manufacturing environments can benefit from cloud technology and better fulfill fast changes in market demands, by applying diverse cloud deployment models and by virtualizing manufacturing processes and assets into services. As cloud becomes the basis of most innovative manufacturing IT systems, its future role in Cyber-physical Production Systems has to be properly investigated, as their interoperability will play a role of vital importance. In this paper, after a brief introduction to cloud criticality and cloud-based manufacturing, the mutual conceptual similarities in modelling distributed industrial services of two of the major standardization frameworks for industrial Internet architectures are presented: the Industrial Internet Reference Architecture (IIRA) and the Reference Architectural Model Industrie (RAMI 4.0). It is also introduced how their integration feasibility finds a strong affinity in specifications of the Open Connectivity Unified Architecture, a service-oriented architecture candidate to the standardization of Industrial Internet of Things based manufacturing platforms. Finally, the preliminary architecture of a prototype Smart Factory is presented as a case study