Mitsubishi moves towards integrated automation solutions.

According to Mitsubishi Electric, manufacturing and production industries are set to see significant change as automation systems become more and more integrated. End users are increasingly demanding better quality products, almost immediate availability and more product variants. There is also a growing need for traceability, energy efficiency, resource management, and coordination across multiple production sites.

As one of the world’s largest automation companies, Mitsubishi Electric is able to respond to this with many in-house technologies and solutions. These include PLCs, Computerized Numerical Controls (CNC), servo motion, robotics, inverter drives, Human machine interfaces (HMI) and related energy saving technologies and its e-F@ctory concept.

Mitsubishi Electric is constantly developing its technologies so that they are always state of the art. Mitsubishi Electric‘s current iQ series of PLCs combine all the key automation functions on one controller and are part of the iQ Platform of enabling solutions for factory automation systems. iQ Platform facilitates easy systems integration by offering an extensive array of field devices and controller types, like integration of CNCs that seamlessly operate together on the same backplane. This delivers the benefits of reduced total cost of ownership, seamless integration, transparent communications and maximised productivity.

Shop-floor to top-floor

Integrated shop floor automation can also be connected to higher level control systems such as SCADA (supervisory control and data acquisition), ERP (enterprise resource planning) and MES (manufacturing execution systems). The integration can go even further, with connections to suppliers, distributors, customers and end users so that the entire manufacturing value chain is interconnected and managed as a whole. This is increasingly close to the vision of Industry 4.0.; an integration of both physical and cyber-based systems across multiple sites and organisations so that performance is optimised at every stage of the value chain.

THE E-F@CTORY APPROACH

e-F@ctory is Mitsubishi Electric’s integrated concept to build reliable and flexible solutions that enable users to achieve many of their high speed, information driven manufacturing aspirations. Through its partner solution activity, the e-F@ctory Alliance, and its work with open network associations such as The CC-Link Partner Association (CLPA), users can build comprehensive solutions based on a wide ranging “best in class” principle.

Mitsubishi Electric’s e-F@ctory Alliance is a partnership of specialist automation companies, whose expertise can be called upon whenever it is required. Each partner is an expert in a particular field and any number of them can be brought together for a given project, thus delivering the best possible skill set. The partners are able to act in perfect harmony to produce the optimum solution in the minimum time to reduce total cost of ownership and provide truly seamless integration of multiple systems and subsystems.

To assist with this Mitsubishi Electric and e-F@ctory partner Adroit Technologies have developed MAPS (Mitsubishi Adroit Process Suite), a life-cycle software tool that brings together all phases of a production project, from the earliest design concepts to the actual operational stage, so that they can be managed as an integrated whole.

REDUCED ENGINEERING TIME AND RESOURCES

It reduces the time spent in the engineering and pre-production stages by automatically managing data relating to areas such as I/O schedules, PLC and SCADA tag configuration etc. so that information is always up to date, accurate and complete. Once production has started MAPS continues to collect and interpret comprehensive data to assist with management scheduling, maintenance and plant upgrades.

Contact us to find out more about how the Mitsubishi Electric e-F@ctory and the e-F@ctory Alliance can help you achieve integrated manufacturing whilst still retaining the ability to choose the most optimal suppliers and solutions.

 Go here to open the e-F@ctory brochure