An Ontology-Based Reference Model for Semantic Data Integration in Digital Production Engineering

Currently, in the digital planning process of a manufacturing plant several industry partners are typically involved. Usually, the original equipment manufacturer (OEM) commissions the main contractor to carry out the whole digital planning of e.g. a manufacturing plant. In turn, the main contractor involves several subcontractors for particular sub-domains. During their collaboration, all partners have to exchange data with each other. However the seamless data integration is hindered by several obstacles. On the one hand partners usually have a partially overlapping view on the end product, which often means data redundancy. On the other hand, the different tool interfaces and views lead to semantic heterogeneity during data exchange. These obstacles result in longer plant planning times and cause enormous costs for the partners. The research project MODALE aims to overcome these obstacles by introducing an ontology-based reference model. In this paper we give a detailed presentation of the problems of data heterogeneity during the digital planning process of a plant, introduce the main concepts of our reference model based approach and highlight the main business benefits of our results.