Open the portal and define the innovation boundary

Innovative technologies are everywhere, and risks follow. For large enterprises that already have a mature market, these emerging technologies may become a sudden threat and show subversive power; It may just be a flash in the pan, but as an overload information, it requires a lot of energy to identify. With the rapid development of many digital technologies, this challenge is particularly obvious for large enterprises. The essence of big company disease is stress, and the innovation system begins to become bloated. When people expect an elephant to dance, they are actually discussing how to make an enterprise's innovation system light and respond quickly to external changes. Small and medium-sized enterprises are often invisible people with dragon killing knives. It's not that people don't care about this innovation ability, but their own volume and history can't attract people's attention.  
 
 The way to solve the problem does not have to look for a win-win mechanism through innovation within the enterprise. The "gray innovation" theory points out that the value of the manufacturing industry is not a single line of the smile curve, but an overlapping area similar to the rabbit ear. In this gray area formed by the cooperation of several organizations, knowledge flows across organizations, and innovation takes place in a mixed form. A way to make elephants light and ants prominent is spreading in practice.  
 

Wavering before taking the first step

SMEs tend to be more sensitive and dynamic to innovative technologies. At present, there are more than 40 million enterprises in China, of which more than 95% are small and medium-sized enterprises. These enterprises, especially start-ups, are often the main force of innovation, but the market often does not give them opportunities. If there is a connection that allows them to go deep into the needs of users, their vitality will be greatly released. Schneider Electric launched the "win-win plan" to grow together with small and medium-sized enterprises, and introduced small and medium-sized enterprises to the front-line site of the factory through the trust of the former in the user end as an endorsement. This was originally a bottom-up innovation plan, derived from the thinking of digital transformation under the impact of the epidemic in 2020. How to better adapt to digital transformation, and how to provide a symbiotic and win-win platform for small and medium-sized enterprises with technical advantages in the fields of big data analysis, AI visual recognition and intelligence? The green intelligent manufacturing win-win plan has been mentioned on the desktop under this background.  
 
 It sounds that the Dragon slaying knife of small and medium-sized enterprises seems to be waiting for the quenching of this last fire.  
 
 However, innovation is not a relaxing afternoon tea in the sun, but a sleepless night of tossing and turning. When the earliest scheme of the win-win plan was put forward internally, it was not highly recognized in the initial stage. After two rounds of discussion, the project team reached an agreement. Everything is a try attitude, and some concerns are obvious. Because of all the sources of demand, enterprise personnel and users need to communicate one by one to find the minefield to be blasted at the scene of artillery fire. There is no doubt that this is thankless.  
 
 However, since the horn sounded, the detailed needs of end users began to be collected one by one. Fortunately, many customers have a lot of difficulties and queue up to solve them, including energy efficiency, personnel efficiency, predictive maintenance, etc. However, these demands are subject to capital and other reasons, and do not have to be solved immediately, but there must always be a vanguard to explore the border. The win-win plan has received the user's response. However, the user's requirements are always vague at the beginning, which requires a lot of work to complete the definition and description of requirements in the early stage.  
 
 All these make the road of exploration a little difficult.  
 

Digital transformation, scene is king

 In the process of industrial digital transformation, people's trust in new technologies is often the lowest. In this case, it is a safe path to choose a scene for breakthrough and then promote it on a large scale. The digitization of front-line production and manufacturing scenes originally has great room for improvement. However, due to the complexity of industrial site, it is necessary to find appropriate business application scenarios in order to promote enterprise development and change. Rich and diverse scene applications and small and medium-sized enterprises with unique knife technology are like coffee and milk, which are the best exploration partners. However, small and medium-sized enterprises that often do not lack technology are short of resources and scenes, so it is difficult to obtain positive development opportunities. Conversely, the pain points of the scene are everywhere within the enterprise. This is a world of serious information asymmetry.  
 
 A new model of innovation is needed to open this impasse. Before implementing new technologies, an enterprise often has a pioneer group to do proof of concept (POC), that is, a short-term and incomplete implementation of some ideas, just to prove its feasibility. Its methodology is from creativity to innovation, to prototype, and then to verification.  
 
 The proof of concept is generally forward-looking and has some distance from the actual needs. There are many digital technologies, including artificial intelligence and big data analysis, and the occasions for enterprise concept verification have increased significantly. However, this is not a new technology that manufacturers can fully control, so the introduction of innovative running water from the outside is undoubtedly the simplest path.  
 
 As a large manufacturer of lithium battery cathode materials, mobile devices such as handheld PDA, industrial platform, smart bracelet and interphone have been widely used in the production workshop to complete quality control. However, these various information terminals have low integration, and many information cracks have been produced by a variety of information from different sources. The blind and ineffective movement of workers in the plant area, untimely picking of materials and inaccurate spare parts all form a disturbance to the quality. If a new human-computer interaction mode of production line equipment inspection system can be adopted, it can form an effective guidance for operators. This enterprise preliminarily believes that mixed reality (MR) technology, with visual operation guidance and positioning technology, should be a good solution. So how to realize the proof of concept of this technology? For this busy manufacturing plant, the external win-win plan provides a valuable option.  
 
 Scenarios lead the application of new technologies. For new technologies such as artificial intelligence and new vision systems, even traditional industrial giants will be unfamiliar. Tapping the potential of start-ups is the latest trend of ecological innovation. Therefore, the win-win plan chooses a future oriented technical perspective. Many emerging start-ups, especially small and medium-sized enterprises with new digital technologies such as big data analysis, Internet of things, 3D modeling and indoor positioning, have become the focus of recruitment plans.  
 
 It is obviously a win-win model to use the concept verification of the practical school to help customers realize their technical judgment in the future. Large enterprises begin to excavate demand from customer groups; The user is like adding a virtual R & D team; Start-ups are gearing up and waiting to show their edge.  
 
 In the first quarter of the win-win plan, all four projects came from real customers. The experimental field has been opened up. The actual combat operation appears at the place closest to the artillery fire.  
 

Ants choose to run with elephants

 
 Small and medium-sized enterprises are densely distributed in the industrial chain, but they are often relatively weak. From technology to products, there is a gap; The realization of products to business is another gap. It is often the innovation dilemma of small enterprises. In other words, small enterprises with technology do not represent the success of commercialization, but need to get through from products to scenarios and business processes. How can ants find their own strength in the digital transformation?  
 
 One way is to make sure you keep up with the elephant. The benefits of the win-win plan for small and medium-sized enterprises include: first, it can directly bring customers; second, large enterprises are endorsing for small enterprises.  
 
 More importantly, start-ups need to forge their own maturity in business processes. One of the partners, bugong software, has been committed to algorithm driven supply chain collaboration to provide decision support for the scheduling plan of a single plant. After being recruited, he worked directly with multiple departments of large companies and received close guidance from the mentor camp composed of key customer teams. This is a critical moment for small and medium-sized enterprises to build a mature business character.  
 
 As a technology provider of mixed reality, Ruifu time, under the guidance of consultants of large enterprises, began to transform the previous experience such as the operation manual of the lithium battery material enterprise into a visual model; At the same time, according to the requirements of automatic beat, the path planning of materials is set, and dozens of sensors are arranged above the factory to ensure a hybrid reality scheme integrating image, monitoring, operation guidance and path guidance. As the hardware optical system, imaging software and automation system are all carried on the unified automation platform of Schneider Electric, various diversified systems and heterogeneous data sources can be seamlessly integrated together. Originally, the data crack that the manufacturer had the biggest headache was organically closed.  
 
 Many small and medium-sized start-ups often do not show their advantages and have weak ability to fight alone. "Green intelligent manufacturing win-win plan" is more like an ecological home, enabling small and medium-sized enterprises. It has been supported by a package of ecological forest cultivation provided by its partners, whether in product technology, business experience, capital, business platform and expert guidance.  
 
 Also business, also simulation. He is also a partner, a teacher and an apprentice. The power of ecosphere, with small enterprises, breaks through technical and commercial barriers and quickly becomes a racetrack player.  
 
 In an enterprise producing plastic PVC pipes, it is facing the common problems of traditional manufacturing industry. It is often planned manually, and the plant capacity is estimated through Excel table; The actual production progress is opaque, the data between departments are disconnected, and the production implementation is inconsistent with the business objectives. Although the process of this PVC pipe is relatively simple, the time connection between upstream and downstream is meticulous and can not be disconnected. After the heating of the last process, the stretching and drilling of the next process must be completed within the specified time, otherwise the production may be defective. This upstream is partial to the process industry, while the downstream presents the characteristics of discrete manufacturing, which is a nightmare for plant planners and dispatchers. The mixed player composed of rabbit and tortoise needs to find a coordinated beat between fast and slow movements. Such factories often have thousands or even tens of thousands of orders every month. Orders jump in the queue every day, and the orders themselves still change, which can't be dealt with in time by the task scheduling department of manual tabulation, let alone Scheme Simulation and comparison. This leads to the uncertainty of finished products, which can easily lead to serious inventory backlog. The products that have to be stacked outdoors will cause a large number of finished products to be damaged and need to be re produced.  
 
 This is a standard plan with limited capacity and full constraints. This plan needs to consider the restrictive factors of materials, machines, personnel, technology and delivery date at the same time. Due to the large planning workload, the manufacturer cannot calculate the production plan considering multiple constraints according to its actual capacity. In the win-win plan, bugong software has actively integrated into the ecosystem of large enterprises. On the one hand, it obtains the user's three-week real plan scheduling and actual production data, and at the same time, it obtains the correlation between various constraints (for example, a mold corresponds to several products). At the same time, the machine data of the automatic production line is combined with the planning optimization software. In the process of simulation, 5000 orders of the factory often involve millions of data, and the time of production scheduling takes less than 10 seconds. Overproduction, unbalanced machine load, overstock of materials and other disruptive factors, such as wrinkles on clothes, were ironed by software soldering iron in an instant. This is the effect of improving decision-making efficiency that pipe manufacturers want to see. With the insight provided by planning software, field managers become smarter.  
 
 With the ability of ecology, the sharp knife technology of small and medium-sized enterprises suddenly becomes sharp. Elephants, walk together.  
 

Stacking sound in cold storage: intelligent stacking, shelf sorting

In the cold chain three-dimensional warehouse of fresh food, order picking may be carried out for hundreds of stores and hundreds of thousands of tons of refrigerated / frozen products every day. Many orders with multiple varieties and small batches depend on manual handling; The warehouse is often more than 20 degrees below zero, and the poor environment often leads to lack of work. Using robots is the best way. However, the robot is not easy in the face of hybrid palletizing. It needs to calculate the number of empty pallets, carton details, position and space sequence on each pallet, and ensure the balance and deviation correction of the center of gravity of the loaded pallet. Small hybrid palletizing is actually a problem all over the world and has become a hot spot in the academic community. Academia pays more attention to how to stack more objects. A pile may have tens of thousands of boxes of different sizes and weights. The higher the yard, the higher the loading rate. For industry, no matter how high the code is, the first is stability. There can be no error, whether static or dynamic; Also consider efficiency and make it as high as possible. Entropy intelligence, a company from Shenzhen that guides robot path planning, is determined to challenge this balance. With the help of its own 3D industrial vision system and high-precision 3D measurement, in order to effectively guide the robot to carry out palletizing operation. However, the generation of palletizing model must rely on real data to train. Because the model will be limited by the data characteristics of the front end. In different scenarios, the obtained data will deviate in practice. Even for a box, the obtained size will change, such as deformation and damage of the box, resulting in uneven weight, etc. The possible change trend of actual data is of great significance for modeling.  
 
 As an enterprise focusing on the development of cold storage industry, jingkelun has a very urgent demand for intelligent palletizing. Under the joint efforts of the two, entropy intelligence carefully combed the various changing data in the stack, and obtained these massive and real data. This is of great significance for correcting the basic theoretical data of entropy intelligence.  
 
 With these models and data, the mobile stability and space utilization of palletizing begin to be improved in front of the order hybrid palletizing software with intensive algorithm. The prospect of intelligent palletizing of robots suddenly brightened up. Jingkelun was very satisfied with the application of cold storage in this special environment, and signed a memorandum of cooperation with entropy wisdom at the acceptance site of concept verification. After the concept verification, the 3D vision system has been installed on the existing stacker, and the online joint commissioning verification based on the stacker model and mechanical system has been carried out. The real artillery fire comes with accuracy.  
 
 From the review agenda of the proof of concept, there will be broader commercialization space in the future. Intelligent palletizing will extend from the inside of cold storage to multi cold storage coordination and external logistics. This means that the strategy of a start-up company is falling into the right soil and beginning to sprout and grow.  
 

Innovative double yellow egg

How to define the product of proof of concept is a key problem. This is an important responsibility of Schneider Electric as the "innovation mentor" of the enterprise. How to divide different stages and corresponding product characteristics in about half a year. Because it is a deadline proposition composition, the technical iteration must have a clear plan.  
 
 
 In the first one or two months of the first quarter of the green intelligent manufacturing win-win plan, it was faced with considerable difficulties. The field army practice of start-ups has been impacted by the strict process operation of the regular army. Small and medium-sized enterprises are very vulnerable. It would have required practical combat in the next few years to be robust in the face and nose. However, in this new innovation pilot field, Schneider Electric uses its demand management method to assist start-ups in product definition. This requires a complete set of methodology. The whole process is actually the training of thinking framework and product definition, which is the most important skill for start-ups.  
 
 The win-win plan project is similar to a double yellow egg, an outer ring, surrounded by two inner rings. In the middle are start-ups and end users, while the outside is wrapped with thick egg white, which provides rich nutrition.  
 
 In the second quarter of the win-win plan launched this year, AsiaInfo security, which provides network security, provides virtual machine security protection suite, and Amazon cloud technology provides cloud platform and cloud computing facilities. The industrial vision platform and 5g laboratory test instrument of Zhongke Chuangda can further optimize the ability of industrial vision and other scenes. As one of the organizers, the international economic and technological cooperation center of the Ministry of industry and information technology will bring a broader platform for the implementation of innovative solutions, with the support of the Global Industry Research Institute of Tsinghua University, the smart factory Research Institute and the venture state. Schneider Electric is mainly responsible for technical counselors, like a unpaid CTO. Its innovation and investment department can also provide financial incubation and business model acceleration support for excellent enterprises. One hero and ten gangs, the road of entrepreneurship and innovation of small and medium-sized enterprises, is no longer lonely.  
 
 The result was also unexpected. As users have more technical selectivity and insight into the future, manufacturers' satisfaction has increased significantly. From the actual results of the first quarter, two customers were very satisfied with the quality of the proof of concept and had preliminary intention to sign a contract.  
 
 After a year of operation, the war ended in November last year, which has been fully recognized by partners, demand enterprises and small and medium-sized enterprises. After practice, this plan is benefiting all parties, empowering small and medium-sized enterprises with digital technology and innovation experience, and jointly opening up the "last mile" of digital transformation. Now, factory manufacturers and users are also actively involved. In the second quarter, six scenarios have been launched, including predictive maintenance of key equipment in the cement industry, predictive maintenance of key equipment in the food and beverage industry, active safety management platform for power plant personnel, smart factory solutions in the leisure food industry, unmanned control system of bucket wheel stacker reclaimer in the digital stockyard, digital carbon management, etc., becoming a gradually enriched scene pool, Thus, the selection of projects can be better. These scenarios may form a complete scheme in the future to provide users with greater value.  
 
 A behaviorist drama itself has become a part of life. This is a new innovation under the new development pattern.  
 

Notes: New Partnership

A win-win plan is just a torrent in the huge wave of digital transformation. Its real value lies not in the competition itself, nor in the prospect of proof of concept. This is an innovative form. It is showing a new kind of bone.  
 
 In the past, in the traditional business model, large manufacturers often provided services to users through distributors or system integrators. The pipe is transparent and efficient. However, in the face of multi-dimensional new technologies, the coherent channel model familiar for many years is becoming inadequate. The start-ups, which have always fought alone, are labeled with doubts and progress is slow.  
 
 Digital transformation needs to be re recognized. The first thing it needs to break is the understanding of boundaries. In the future, it will no longer be a single enterprise, nor a partnership relying on strong coupling. It needs more relaxed forms and more diversified scene breakthroughs. There is an urgent need for joint action between large enterprises and small and medium-sized enterprises. Large enterprises can give full play to their mature customer relations and stable technical style, while small and medium-sized enterprises may do a lot in their focus areas. Even large companies will benefit a lot from it and complement cutting-edge technologies, such as the combination of accurate indoor positioning and machine vision.  
 
 For an enterprise, internal innovation often occurs on the edge and is often ignored. If the fringe is connected with external partners, it will often have a huge impact. This is a new type of partnership. The future competitiveness of enterprises is no longer a separate struggle between enterprises, but a collision between enterprise Corps. Small and medium-sized enterprises are converging and forming an ecological force that can not be ignored.