Shen Bin from CAICT: 5G factories promote high-quality development of "5G+Industrial Internet"

In August 2022, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology officially released the "Guidelines for the Construction of 5G Fully Connected Factories" (hereinafter referred to as the "Guidelines"), which pointed out that 5G factories are to make full use of the integration of new-generation information and communication technologies represented by 5G, create a new type of industrial Internet infrastructure, and newly build or renovate production sites such as production lines, workshops, and factories to form advanced factories with extensive connections between production units, deep integration of information (IT) and operations (OT), full utilization of data elements, and efficient empowerment of innovative applications.

The "Guidelines" clearly define the construction goals of 5G factories, namely, during the "14th Five-Year Plan" period, it will mainly focus on manufacturing industries such as raw materials, equipment, consumer goods, electronics, and key industries such as mining, ports, and electricity, to promote 10,000 companies to carry out 5G factory construction, build 1,000 classified and graded factories with distinctive characteristics, create 100 benchmark factories, and promote the in-depth development of 5G integrated applications.

After the release of the Guidelines, it has attracted widespread attention from industrial enterprises and basic telecommunications companies, and some companies have quickly deployed and implemented them. According to statistics from the Industrial Internet Industry Alliance through the "5G Factory Seed Project", there are more than 1,800 5G factory projects across the country, involving 29 provinces, autonomous regions, and municipalities directly under the central government, covering 10 "5G+Industrial Internet" key industries such as equipment manufacturing, electronic equipment manufacturing, petrochemicals, mining, steel, electricity, textiles, building materials, ports, and home appliances, as well as other industries such as non-ferrous metals and materials. Project types have included production lines, workshops, factories and other levels.

Through the rapid promotion of 5G factories, a good development trend has been formed in many aspects such as factory infrastructure construction, 5G applications, and industrial ecology, effectively promoting enterprises to improve quality, reduce costs, increase efficiency, and develop in a green and safe manner.

A three-layer infrastructure architecture of "end-edge-cloud" based on 5G network has been basically formed

The Guidelines clearly state that 5G factory construction includes four aspects: infrastructure construction, on-site factory upgrades, key link applications, and network security protection. The infrastructure includes the construction of 5G networks, industrial network interconnection, edge computing, and business systems.

Judging from the construction of the "5G Factory Seed Project", basic telecommunications companies are all building 5G networks in the project area in response to project construction needs and future corporate development, and most of them have adopted a hybrid private network construction model in which core network elements such as UPF are deployed in the factory, and 5G networks are connected to the Internet of Things, production control networks, production management networks, security monitoring networks, office networks, etc. according to actual business needs. Industrial enterprises are transforming on-site equipment into 5G to enhance the mobility of equipment to meet the needs of enterprises for fast line switching, flexible production, and equipment mobility over a wider range.

5G factories make full use of the wide connection and large bandwidth of 5G networks, deploy a large number of sensors and cameras in the factory, realize the collection of various data on the production site, and lay a data foundation for the digital transformation of enterprises. At present, the number of on-site equipment terminals accessed through 5G networks is gradually increasing. Through the supporting network management system, the network operation status and equipment networking status can be monitored in real time.

At the same time, 5G factories further guide enterprises to accelerate the construction of infrastructure such as industrial Internet platforms, edge computing, and data storage nodes, and deploy industrial software or APPs on industrial Internet platforms, edge clouds, edge gateways, edge controllers and other facilities according to the actual business needs of enterprises. Combined with artificial intelligence, big data, AV/VR and other technologies, the production, operation, and management efficiency of enterprises can be improved, the operating costs of enterprises can be reduced, and production energy efficiency can be improved.

At present, through the construction of 5G factories, a three-layer infrastructure architecture of "end-edge-cloud" based on 5G networks has basically been formed, effectively solving the problems of inability to communicate with each other and data information "islands" within factories in the past.

Promote the expansion of "5G+Industrial Internet" application scenarios to production control links

In the construction and development of 5G factories, "5G+Industrial Internet" application scenarios such as machine vision quality inspection, factory intelligent logistics, and production site monitoring have been widely implemented in various industries.

Machine vision quality inspection makes full use of the large bandwidth characteristics of 5G. During the quality inspection process, quality inspection terminals such as industrial cameras or laser scanners are connected to the 5G network through embedded 5G modules or deployed 5G gateways, and real-time high-definition images of products are transmitted to the expert system through the 5G network. The expert system performs real-time analysis based on artificial intelligence algorithm models to determine whether the product has defects; on this basis, it effectively records product quality information to help companies achieve product quality traceability and product optimization.

The factory's intelligent logistics makes full use of the wireless transmission characteristics of 5G, and equips AGVs, RGVs and other material transport vehicles in the factory with 5G modules or connects them to 5G gateways, so that they can be arranged according to the routes of the logistics scheduling system, and accurately deliver materials between the three-dimensional warehouse and each production station at a fixed time, fixed point, and fixed quantity, effectively reducing warehousing costs and improving operational efficiency and warehousing management capabilities.

Production site monitoring makes full use of the wide connection and large bandwidth characteristics of 5G, connects a large number of sensors, cameras and data acquisition terminals deployed at the production site to the 5G network, and transmits the collected monitoring data such as the environment, personnel movements, and equipment operation to the production site monitoring system in real time, performs high-precision identification of production activities, customized alarms and regional monitoring, and provides real-time reminders of abnormal conditions, providing guarantees for safe production, energy efficiency management, etc.

At the same time, during the construction of 5G factories, industrial enterprises, basic telecommunications companies, solution providers and other units are exploring the application scenarios of "5G+Industrial Internet" and expanding them to the production control link.

Currently, commercial 5G can achieve technical indicators of latency less than 20 milliseconds and reliability higher than 99.99%. The control system can be deployed in the cloud and combined with video and collected data to achieve remote control of equipment.

For example, in the steel industry, "one-click steelmaking" and "one-click ironmaking" have been realized; in the port industry, operators have been able to remotely control multiple gantry cranes; in the mining industry, operators have been able to remotely control tunnel boring machines and other typical application scenarios.

At the "2023 Industrial Internet Conference", five companies including China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, China Unicom, Seiko Automation, Shanghai Boao Automation, and Huawei jointly released a 5G high-reliability, low-latency automotive flexible production line, achieving technical indicators of 5G latency of 4 milliseconds and reliability of 99.999%. It is also applied to multiple production control links such as robot gripper switching and accompanying fixture control on automobile production lines, further shortening the automobile production cycle and increasing production capacity.

Strengthen cooperation and form a "two-way" development trend

5G factories require joint construction by industrial enterprises, basic telecommunications enterprises, solution providers or system integrators.

In the process of promoting 5G factories, basic telecommunications companies not only provide 5G network construction for 5G factories, but also work with industrial enterprises, solution providers, etc. to explore the effective application of 5G networks, create a series of application scenarios, and provide subsequent network operation and maintenance services for industrial enterprises based on the pain points and difficult problems that urgently need to be solved in the production, operation and management of industrial enterprises.

Industrial enterprises and solution providers have also sent relevant experts to actively discuss with experts in the information and communication industry, and gradually make appropriate adjustments to the production cycle, production processes, etc. to adapt to 5G, further promote the application of 5G in core links such as production control, and propose the requirement to directly integrate 5G into industrial equipment, so as to lower the threshold for equipment to access the 5G network, which will be more conducive to the industrial application of 5G.

At the same time, industrial enterprises proposed to hand over the subsequent network services to basic telecommunications enterprises and cooperate with basic telecommunications enterprises by purchasing services. It can be said that the construction of 5G factories has further promoted the in-depth cooperation between industry and the information and communication industry, and has formed a "two-way" development trend.

At present, through the construction of 5G factories, the value of industrial enterprises in improving quality, reducing costs, increasing efficiency, and green and safe development has been effectively increased by an average of 10% to 17%. The value expectations of enterprises for 5G factory construction are generally higher than 50%, and some enterprises even exceed 100%.

In the next stage, it is recommended to further accelerate the progress of "5G+Industrial Internet" in technology, products, applications, and ecological construction. Relevant units should jointly develop standardized plans for the construction of 5G factories in the industry, reduce enterprise construction costs, and speed up the clarification of 5G factory construction indicators so that enterprises can carry out construction more targetedly; regularly conduct 5G factory construction effectiveness evaluations, strengthen the creation of 5G factory benchmarks, and continue to "polish" the 5G factory brand.