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Process Industry: Three Use Cases Driving Real Impact

what did
We do here?

KIT built a modular process industry demon­strator as a shared, real-world envi­ron­ment. Within this setup, OI4 members devel­oped and combined three use cases, bringing different part­ners, systems, and tech­nolo­gies together in one place. The demon­strator shows how these use cases interact, how data flows across engi­neering, commis­sioning, and oper­a­tion, and how inter­op­er­ability works in prac­tice within one inte­grated scenario.

Who was
Partic­i­pating?

3 use cases
1 demon­strator

A plant on a pallet…? But it runs like a real factory

The demon­strator is a modular process industry setup devel­oped by KIT as part of a hands-on automa­tion lab. Built as a compact, trans­portable unit, it consists of small, modular plant elements that can be combined and controlled inde­pen­dently. This makes it possible to simu­late real indus­trial envi­ron­ments while keeping the system flex­ible and easy to adapt.

At the same time, it serves as a testbed for new approaches in indus­trial automa­tion. Different tech­nolo­gies, archi­tec­tures, and concepts can be imple­mented and vali­dated under real­istic condi­tions, from engi­neering through to oper­a­tion. The setup brings together multiple part­ners and systems, allowing ideas from different work­streams to be tested together in one consis­tent envi­ron­ment.

This creates a prac­tical envi­ron­ment to demon­strate how modern process industry setups can work. Instead of isolated exam­ples, the demon­strator shows how different pieces interact, how data flows across systems, and how new approaches can be applied in a real, inte­grated scenario.

USE CASE 1 | INDUS­TRIAL CONTROL AS A SERVICE

What?
The use case “Indus­trial Control as a Service” is imple­mented on the “Vertical Farming Module”, which is a modular demon­strator for the process Industry owned by the KIT. The module there­fore is split in two inde­pen­dent Process Equip­ment Assem­blies (PEA) that are controlled by diff erent cloud controllers and orches­trated via a common Process Orches­tra­tion Layer (POL) over Module Type Package (MTP).

Moti­va­tion
Process plant owners and oper­a­tors face increas­ingly complex automa­tion systems while needing to respond faster to market changes. This drives the need to reduce complexity, shorten time to market, and mini­mize update times. Future systems must be more capable, yet easier to commis­sion and main­tain. Indus­trial Control as a Service (ICaaS) helps bridge IT and OT, enabling faster rollout, lower complexity, and easier inte­gra­tion of tech­nolo­gies like AI.

Value Propo­si­tion
The solu­tion off ers a shorter time to market, simpli­fied engi­neering and commis­sioning, and enhanced scal­a­bility of OT tech­nology by elim­i­nating the need for edge hard­ware. It also ensures inter­op­er­ability between various suppliers and allows for easy inte­gra­tion of advanced tech­nolo­gies like AI.

USE CASE 2 | ENGI­NEERING TO OPER­A­TIONS

What?
The use case “Engi­neering to Oper­a­tions” is imple­mented in the “Vertical Farming Module”, which is a modular demon­strator for the process Industry owned by the KIT. The objec­tive is to have a stan­dard­ized digital twin along the whole engi­neering process. The AAS is used as a tech­nical basis to exchange Data between a compo­nent supplier and a system inte­grator.

Moti­va­tion
System inte­gra­tors face growing pres­sure from plant oper­a­tors to deliver flex­ible automa­tion solu­tions faster. Engi­neering still relies heavily on expe­ri­ence and manual work due to missing unified data models and inter­op­er­able tools. An inter­op­er­able digital twin helps opti­mize inter­faces across compa­nies, reduce manual effort, and shorten project lead times.

Value Propo­si­tion
The avail­ability of data in a stan­dard­ized form, inde­pen­dent of suppliers, simplifi es engi­neering and enables faster coor­di­na­tion with all parties involved. Addi­tion­ally, there is less over­head due to auto­mated compat­i­bility and confor­mity checks.

USE CASE 3 | AUTO­MATED AS BUILT (NAMUR NE 176)

What?
The use case “Auto­mated as Built (Namur NE 176)” is imple­mented in the “Vertical Farming Module”, which is a modular demon­strator for the process Industry owned by the KIT. The objec­tive is to compare live para­me­ters of sensors with their “asbuilt” para­me­ters. To docu­ment and contin­u­ously check sensor param­e­triza­tion the AAS is used as a tech­nical basis.

Moti­va­tion
Moni­toring sensors on the shopfl oor is time-consuming with a lot of neces­sary but ineffi cient manual activ­i­ties from the oper­a­tors due to the missing inter­op­er­ability between the various systems and suppliers as well as the insuffi cient inte­gra­tion of the indi­vidual assets. Also, Using an inter­op­er­able digital twin to get a trans­parent view of the plant with the numerous sensors on the shopfloor and reduce manual eff orts in oper­a­tions.

Value Propo­si­tion
The avail­ability of sensor para­me­ters in a stan­dard­ized form, inde­pen­dent of suppliers, ensures unifor­mity and flex­i­bility in system inte­gra­tion. This is further supported by simpli­fied main­te­nance, which is achieved through auto­mated noti­fi­ca­tions in case of anom­alies, ensuring quicker response times. Addi­tion­ally, the archi­tec­ture is future-proof and designed to be ready for Manufacturing‑X use cases, enhancing its adapt­ability and long-term rele­vance in modern manu­fac­turing envi­ron­ments.

Member
voices

Indus­trial Control as a Service (ICaaS) has the poten­tial to bring the IT and OT worlds closer together. It promises a shorter time to market, less complexity for plant owners/operators, while enabling easy inte­gra­tion of advanced tech­nolo­gies such as AI.

Process plant owners/operators are faced with the chal­lenge of commis­sioning, main­taining and managing increas­ingly complex automa­tion systems. Depending on the use case, these automa­tion systems must fulfil a growing list of require­ments — from real-time commu­ni­ca­tion, archi­tec­tural flex­i­bility, cross-vendor compat­i­bility to AI inte­gra­tion, OT-secu­rity, compli­ance to NIS‑2 regu­la­tion and more. At the same time, the desire to react faster and more precisely to market trends is driving the reduc­tion of complexity, time-to-market, recon­fig­u­ra­tion and update time of automa­tion systems. In short: future automa­tion systems should be more capable, but at the same time less compli­cated to commis­sion and main­tain than current approaches.

Boehringer Ingel­heim

Partic­i­pated in all 3 use cases

Our moti­va­tion is to apply state-of-the-art IT tech­nolo­gies in OT in a prac­tical way. This use case enables faster devel­op­ment and improved quality assur­ance. It is impor­tant to exchange infor­ma­tion using existing, vendor-inde­pen­dent stan­dards (digital twin, ontolo­gies based on real data).

COPA-DATA

Partic­i­pated in use case 1

The ICaaS demo pushes the boundary of what was previ­ously consid­ered feasible and brings together compa­nies in a way that would have been unthink­able just a few years ago. It enables scal­a­bility of OT tech­nology by elim­i­nating all phys­ical PLC and edge hard­ware, ensures inter­op­er­ability between manu­fac­turers through the complete aban­don­ment of tradi­tional field­buses, and simpli­fies engi­neering through an “as-a-service” approach.

FLECS

Partic­i­pated in use case 1

The moti­va­tion is driven by the need for cross-company digi­tal­iza­tion based on shared, open stan­dards, along with exploring the poten­tial of the AAS in engi­neering. It also focuses on connecting with part­ners who see value in AAS and raising aware­ness for the stan­dard, while ensuring the use case is imple­mented as a working demon­strator rather than a theo­ret­ical concept. The imple­mented solu­tion enables a full view of the asset life­cycle, from engi­neering through to oper­a­tions.

ZETA

Partic­i­pated in use case 2

With TwinCAT 3 OPC UA Pub/Sub, users can use MQTT, the ideal trans­port protocol for cloud-based commu­ni­ca­tion with a message broker. The protocol guar­an­tees a defined payload and relies on the proven secu­rity mech­a­nisms of OPC UA.

TwinCAT MTP enables process tech­nology modules to be flex­ibly inte­grated into the control level, and combining an ICaaS (Indus­trial Control as a Service) and a broker-based approach supports dynamic instan­ti­a­tion of the required modules. This leads to greater flex­i­bility and effi­ciency in the automa­tion of processing systems.

Beck­hoff

Partic­i­pated in use case 1

curious To
learn more?

The Open Industry 4.0 Alliance supported all three use cases throughout the project, bringing together compa­nies and like-minded experts to work jointly in one setup. It provided the struc­ture, network, and collab­o­ra­tion envi­ron­ment to turn ideas into working imple­men­ta­tions across part­ners and tech­nolo­gies. If you are inter­ested in similar projects or want to learn more, get in touch.

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