Today, artificial intelligence (AI) iseverywhere: mobile phone voice assistants, smart home lighting systems, andsoon autonomous vehicles. But these only touch the tip of the iceberg in termsof AI’s potentials.

Dr. Roland Busch, the COO, CTO andMember of the Managing Board of Siemens AG, said, “There’s a form of AI that wecan all benefit from: AI that’s integrated into industrial processes to createvalue on an industrial scale.” 

Siemens has been focusing on data analyticsand AI for some 30 years, and developing business by successfully applying AI in industrialcontexts. In 2019, Siemens CorporateTechnology set up AI Lab China in Beijing, thecompany’s first in Asia. It acts as a new innovation hub for Siemens, extendingits global AI network and providing Chinese customers with leading industrialAI solutions.

Siemens’ suiteof AI solutions is custom-tailored to each individual customer’s needs, playingan important role in intelligent prediction, advanced diagnostics and automaticoptimization. 

Prediction: shifting from periodical inspection toreal-time prediction.Qingdao Refining & Chemical Co.,Ltd. (Qingdao Refining) has laid a solid digital foundation by adopting SiemensSIMATIC PCS 7, SIMIT and COMOS, creating a favorable environment for its AIimplementation.

The AI solution from Siemens helps thehighly automated plant consolidate data from hundreds of sensors, and detectcorrelations that human minds are incapable of identifying. Based on historicaldata and current conditions, AI technologies enable the plant to accuratelypredict potential malfunctions in real time, which can be hours or even daysearlier than errors found by traditional periodical inspection.

In the future, Siemens and QingdaoRefining will continue to explore the value of big data via advancedtechnologies, such as cloud computing and edge computing. 

Diagnostics: understanding reasons through“Sino-western therapy”. Long-term, stableoperations of a plant require its ability to not only predict potential risks butalso understand reasons behind them.

In the thermal power industry, forexample, CRPower Holdings Co., Ltd. (CR Power) hopesto leverage advanced digital technologies to achieve remote early warning,analysis, diagnosis and optimization for its power plants across the country.So, CR Power will work together with Siemens to build a Centralized Supervisionand Analysis Specialist System (CSASS) based on Siemens’ MindSphere platform.

For advanced diagnostics, enterprises can now benefit from the Siemens AI solution thatacts as a “Sino-western therapy”. Its intelligent systems can identify patternsof sensor data through machine learning and, at the same time, incorporateknowledge graphs to diagnose problems according to signs and symptoms.

Optimization: breaking the bottleneckof intelligent manufacturing.Likethe supercomputer AlphaGo that can improve its performance while playing,industrial devices and systems can use AI to automatically optimize duringoperation.

In the plant of FAWDE, JiefangAutomotive Co., Ltd. (FAWDE), thehigh-end CNC machine tools use more than 10 types of expensive cutting tools,whose parameter settings are the key to balancing the cost and quality. Settingshort lifetimes on tools will lead to high costs,while setting long lifetimes may affect product quality or even cause damage toCNC machine tools. Through machine learning algorithms, Siemens AI team helpsFAWDE determine the optimal lifetimes of tools in real-time production.

Undoubtedly, industrial AI is givingthe fourth Industrial Revolution a huge boost and taking “Industrie 4.0” to thenext level.