New solutions for digitalisation – from the transformation of blast furnaces to the vision of an autonomous steel mill, from digital smelting to Foundry 4.0 – are cutting edge topics at the “Bright World of Metals”.
Steel producers and aluminium smelters, producers of non-ferrous metals and foundries, metal processing companies across the entire world of metals have recognised the chances inherent in digitalisation. The agenda does not contain disruptive new business models, but first of all improved results and expanded service offers. With the help of sophisticated sensors and cloud computing, supported by Artificial Intelligence (AI), waste during production can be reduced, the output can be increased and the cost of energy brought down.
Metallurgical machines and systems make independent decisions, supported by AI and based on sensor data and its evaluations. For example, the digitalised forging company of the future will detect an imminent crack and give an early warning of wear. For every forged part, the process data is saved to a data set, and the carbon footprint measured with an exact CO2 value and documented.
The digital wave has caught up with both plant operators and plant engineers. Technologies like Virtual Reality (VR) and Augmented Reality (AR) up to Digital Twin support companies in developing new products, from remote maintenance and set-up of new systems.
