Just six months after its expansion, Plattform Industrie 4.0 is already the largest and most diverse Industrie 4.0 network worldwide, with over 250 participants from more than 100 organisations. Also present, in addition to State Secretary Matthias Machnig and Federal Minister of Education and Research Johanna Wanka, were: Reinhard Clemens, Deutsche Telekom AG; Jörg Hofmann, IG Metall; Bernd Leukert, SAP SE; Prof. Reimund Neugebauer, Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft; Prof. Siegfried Russwurm, Siemens AG; and Dr. Eberhard Veit, Festo AG.

“We need to facilitate access to Industrie 4.0 for SMEs especially. Small and medium-sized enterprises usually have limited research capacities and therefore need ways to test in realistic settings whether their new ideas and procedures are fit for Industrie 4.0. This is increasingly done in testbeds and we want to help companies make greater use of these testing platforms in Germany,” said Johanna Wanka, federal minister of education and research. “With the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft, we have one of the largest international scientific organisations of applied research on board and involved in the development of the testbeds,” the minister emphasised. “In addition, with its Industrial Data Space, the Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft provides the technical basis for companies to exchange data securely and according to their own rules.”

The state secretary at the Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy, Matthias Machnig: “Even on a global scale, Plattform Industrie 4.0 is one of the largest networks in the field of Industrie 4.0.” Both German and foreign, internationally active companies are working closely together here. This bundled competence for the digitisation of our industry in Germany makes the platform a very sought-after partner internationally. Talks on future international collaborations are already underway. By the National IT Summit at the latest, the platform will provide a virtual map of more than 100 examples of Industrie 4.0 applications in Germany. Small and medium-sized businesses in particular will for the first time have a coordinated approach and overview that can provide them with momentum on their own road to digitised manufacturing.”

Prof. Siegfried Russwurm, member of the board at Siemens, sees great potential in Plattform Industrie 4.0 to strengthen Germany’s position as a leading supplier of Industrie 4.0 technologies. “Germany is the leading supplier in this field. Thanks to the network established by Plattform Industrie 4.0 and the industry associations, we can reach more than 7000 companies through the economic and digital associations. And they are exactly the companies we need on board to maintain first place together.”

Jörg Hofmann, chairman of IG Metall, welcomed the fact that the establishment of Plattform Industrie 4.0 has enabled all parties concerned with the future work to participate. “Industrie 4.0 will only be a success if people are considered from the out-set. Only then can the conditions for “Work 4.0” be created and Industrie 4.0 successfully realised in Germany. This requires qualifications, working time and the way work is organised to be shaped together,” says Hofmann.

Even at this early stage, Plattform Industrie 4.0 in its current form is a model for many other countries. The numerous requests for cooperation from China, Japan, France, South Korea and Slovakia show this. The expertise of Plattform Industrie 4.0 is in demand abroad: Representatives of Plattform Industrie 4.0 met with the French initiative “Industrie du futur” at the Franco-German conference on digitisation on 27 October in Paris. Also at the end of October, German and Chinese representatives met in Beijing for the first working meeting following the declaration of intent concluded with China in July. Plattform Industrie 4.0 is thus also an internationally recognised hub.

Germany’s leadership in Industrie 4.0 is demonstrated by the numerous practical applications of Industrie 4.0 technologies – in both large and small companies. Plattform Industrie 4.0 is currently compiling more than 100 of these practical examples from the business world and will present them in an online “Industrie 4.0 map” at the National IT Summit in mid-November 2015.