LinkedDesign · Linked Knowledge in Manufacturing, Engineering and Design for Next-Generation Production

What is clearly missing in the current ICT landscape for manufacturing is an integrated, holistic view on data across the full product lifecycle. Especially the design and engineering of products and manufacturing processes is decoupled from the actual process execution. As experiences of the past show, a tight integration of all tools used throughout a product lifetime is not feasible.LinkkME addresses these shortcomings by providing an integrated, holistic view on data, persons and processes across the product lifecycle as a vital resource for the outstanding competitive design of novel products and manufacturing processes. To achieve this goal the project will develop the Linked Engineering and mAnufacturing Platform (LEAP) as an integrated information system for manufacturing design. LEAP federates all product lifecycle information relevant to drive engineering and manufacturing processes, independent of its format, location, originator, and time of creation. Besides the unified access to the integrated information, LEAP will provide specific knowledge exploitation solutions like sentiment analysis and design decision support systems to analyse the integrated information.Within LinkkME we aim for a user-centric lifecycle information management. LEAP will provide a context-driven access to federated information and knowledge and foster cross-discipline collaborations between users by novel approaches for collaborative engineering.Finally, LinkkME will provide tight feedback connections to existing engineering tools (e.g., CAx Systems) in order to push back formalised knowledge to enable the automated design of elementary product components.All concepts and components developed within the LinkkME project will be evaluated using three application prototypes deployed at the application partners' industry sites. Further, the project team will develop four show case demonstrators in the Living Labs associated to the consortium.In terms of impact, partners estimate reductions of up to 50% in time spent for search and knowledge acquisition through the improved (collaborative) information access and reductions of over 20% in time to market through support and automation of product and manufacturing design provided by the engineering platform.