Using a model-based engineering approach for developing Industrial Internet of Things applications

A new trend in the manufacturing sector, better known by the term 'Industry 4.0', will influence all areas and increase the complexity of production processes, product development, maintenance and disposal. The integration of information and communication technologies (ICT) and the advantages of the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) will result in automation processes aiming to optimize efficiency or reduce expenses. However, this results in the emergence of on-demand manufacturing as well as the provision of personalized goods and services, produced in the context of shortened innovation cycles. However, the downside of this trend is the uprising complexity that appears when engineering such systems. Thus, the Reference Architecture Model Industry 4.0 (RAMI 4.0) has been developed by several German associations in order to cope with the complexity of such cross-disciplinary systems. However, at the current point of view, this framework is exhibiting a gap between the architectural model and actual industrial applications. Thus, this paper introduces an approach proposing Round-trip Engineering (RTE) of previously modeled industrial system components. In order to do so, first the information and communication architecture is modeled according to the specifications of RAMI 4.0 and by utilizing OPC UA. Subsequently, the modeled components are generated and applied with the help of FREDOSAR, an open-source system architecture aimed for the application in such a complex system. In the end, data exchange between RAMI 4.0 and the industrial application is established by realizing a bidirectional interface, which is evaluated with a typical industrial case study. © 2020 IEEE.