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“Everyone involved derives benefit from collaboration”

Micro Testbed participants describe their experiences

The Micro Testbeds organized by the Ferdinand-Steinbeis-Institute (FSTI) allow companies to introduce and test solutions to the specific problems they face, working in partnership with other organizations in actual application scenarios. By working together on a multi-sector basis using web-based ecosystems, it is possible to add value in new ways within an ecosystem. People who have actually taken part in an individual Micro Testbed describe how this actually works in practice and how the participating organizations benefit from the process.

Markus Glaser-Gallion CEO Leadec Group Lead partner, Industrial Services Micro Testbed
“We define our playing field for the testbed, understand the rules, and acknowledge that we will depend on one another in the ecosystem of future factories. Tasks and information are shared and the different roles are defined. As a manufacturer-independent service provider with production experience, we see this as an opportunity for Leadec to play a pivotal, lynchpin role in this ecosystem.”

 

Florian Hermle, Managing Director, Balluff GmbH Partner in the Production Performance Management Protocol (PPMP) Micro Testbed
“Our positive experience with the PPMP testbed acted as confirmation that digitalizing production within an ecosystem consisting of equal partners can be pursued in a way that matches targets and the practicalities of business. This is a way to add genuine value for everyone involved.”

 

Dirk Slama, Vice President of Business Development, Bosch Software Innovations GmbH Partner in the PPMP Micro Testbed and Industrial Services Micro Testbed
“Open source and lightweight protocols are important enablers in setting
up cross-domain ecosystems in small steps. Such ecosystems make it
possible for SMEs and big companies to interact with one another and
add even more value. The Micro Testbed showed that everyone who’s
involved derives benefit from collaboration.”

 

Prof. Dr. habil. Heiner Lasi, Director of the Ferdinand-Steinbeis-Institute
“From a scientific standpoint, applying Micro Testbeds to a practical setting confirmed that digitalization shifts value creation into open ecosystems – so consequently, key success factors in planning digital transformation are thinking (and acting) in terms of ‘open ecosystems’.”

 

 

 

Prof. Dr. Herbert Kohler, Vice president of group research and sustainability, chief environmental officer at Daimler AG until 2015, expert member of the Industrial Services Micro Testbed
“Everyone is talking about Digitalization 4.0 and it can be considered the biggest challenge for industry worldwide, but it’s also an opportunity to ‘reinvent oneself’ and become even more successful in the market. The only question is, what sort of tools do SMEs need to make things happen and in particular, what are the right methods and processes to move things forward and make a success out of this as quickly as possible. One highly efficient and, as it turns out, extremely practical option is to use the Micro Testbeds offered by the Ferdinand-Steinbeis- Institute. The implementation process is planned over the course of several workshops involving stakeholders from industry, SMEs, big companies, and technical experts, drawing on the scientific background of Steinbeis University and its experience with international projects. What makes this formula a success is that all participants benefit from implementation and they can become actively involved in the process. The aim is to achieve implementation as described, at least for the pilot project. As initial experience has shown, one decisive factor is selection of the right stakeholders. If you’re clever about selecting the right people and they’re a good fit on a personal level, you can find the win-win situation you wanted for everyone involved and this paves the way for successful implementation.”

 

Thomas Bürkle, Managing Shareholder, Bürkle + Schöck KG, President of the Baden- Wuerttemberg Technical Association for Electrical Engineering and Information Technology and Vice President of the Baden- Wuerttemberg Crafts Congress Partner in the Planning, Construction and Operating with Building Information Modeling (BIM) Micro Testbed and the Manual Trade Micro Testbed
“The BIM testbed allows stakeholders involved in construction to experiment freely and discover how BIM works together. We talk to each other about interfaces that are better networked between different parties involved in the process and advantages to planning, processing, and after sales procedures. This is all the more important given dwindling numbers of manual workers and the fact that processes need to be improved.”

 

Bernhard Müller, Management board member for Industry 4.0 at SICK AG, partner in the PPMP Micro Testbed
“Open exchange within the ‘Forum of Trust’ offered by the Micro Testbed made it possible for us to work up application scenarios with the partner companies on a business level, and that allowed us to identify new business potential and application areas.”