Introduction
This article looks at potential synergies between Enterprise Architecture and Industry 4.0. It is focused on the why and what, not on the how, mainly because to describe the how is specific to an organization, but also too big of a topic to be covered in an article.
The first challenge with Industry 4.0 in general, meaning not limited to Enterprise Architecture, is that there are many definitions of what it is. Especially because the technology vendors and solution providers often define it so it fits nicely with their offerings and capabilities. Therefore, user organizations hear different definitions and get confused.
There is a simple solution to this challenge. You go back to the source that coined the term, which has a clear definition what it is: Platform Industrie 4.0 (https://www.plattform-i40.de/IP/Navigation/EN/Home/home.html). Yes, this is something that was started by the German government to help the manufacturing industry to become more competitive, but over the years this has been adopted in other countries and also other industries. Initiatives, like Manufacturing-X, that were born in the Platform Industrie 4.0 ecosystem, have participants from all over the world. The expansion of Industry 4.0 into other industries and geographies has certainly helped to create standards and best practice for asset-intensive industries.
For me the core benefits of an Industry 4.0 initiative in any organization are:
- Optimize processes through digital technologies
- Improve supply chain resilience
- Drive sustainability outcomes
- Increase customer satisfaction
- Enable business model innovation
- Reduce complexity and cost in digital landscapes
As you can see, Industry 4.0 touches every aspect of an organization, so needs to be considered for the Enterprise Architecture of a firm. EA has a history in IT and although for some time now is recognized also on the business side, I see it rarely including industrial operations, automation and operational technology. That we are talking about IT – OT alignment, like we talk about business – IT alignment for a long time, shows that we still have some way to go for an “Integrated Enterprise Architecture” that is acknowledged to be a key success factor for business strategy execution, and not only a function in IT that looks into new technologies.
In this article, I will look at Enterprise Architecture and Industry 4.0 from three different perspectives:
- The Catena-X initiative of the global automotive industry
- The Sustainable Supply Chain Framework as a collaboration project between Platform Industrie 4.0 and the MIT Alumni Energy, Environment and Sustainability Network
- A business transformation program of a food manufacturer in Australia that is part of a global Fast Moving Consumer Goods (FMCG) player.
Catena-X (www.catena-x.net)
Catena-X is a non-commercial initiative that was started by leading automotive OEMs and suppliers with the goal to:
- Make global supply chains more effective and efficient through defining (digital) standards, including data models, and building Data Space.
- Improve the resilience of global supply chains through better transparency, based on near real-time information exchange on the status of supply chains and the possibility to reconfigure the supply chain, when a disruption occurs.
- Support sustainability efforts by facilitating an effortless data exchange in the supply chain, while remaining in control of your data.
For those of you who want to dive into the topic of Data Spaces from a technical architecture perspective, I highly recommend to look at the Gaia-X architecture: https://docs.gaia-x.eu/technical-committee/architecture-document/25.05/
One aspect of Catena-X and therefore Industry 4.0 are Digital Twins. Like with the term “Industry 4.0”, the definition is wildly different and also often defined by digital product vendors, based on their feature list. As Digital Twins require data and functionality from the IT and OT landscape, it is also a relevant topic for Enterprise Architecture. Also here, there are industry standards and best practices available, mainly from the following two industry associations:
- Digital Twin Consortium: https://www.digitaltwinconsortium.org/
- Industrial Digital Twin Association: https://industrialdigitaltwin.org/en/
One of the challenges for an organization is that all those Industry 4.0 standards are often not yet built into the software product in their IT and OT landscape, but there are software vendors that offer integration solutions to bridge the existing and the new world. For an Enterprise Architect, this approach can and should be considered on an Industry 4.0 Architecture Roadmap.
While Catena-X, and other X-Initiatives, define technical standards, they offer a wide range of business use case descriptions that explain how the technologies fit into specific use cases, like Product Carbon Footprint. You can find an overview of those use cases here: https://eclipse-tractusx.github.io/Kits
Here is an example of the Battery Use Case and its complexity from a supply chain perspective.
Battery Pass Use Case
Catena-X content is published on GitHub as part of the Tractus-X project that is an open-source project of the Eclipse foundation. Besides relevant content on Catena-X standards and KITS, there is also open-source code available to build solutions for the defined use cases.
Here is an example of the value Catena-X can generate.
Catena-X Case Study – BMW
Sustainable Supply Chain Framework (https://github.com/mitsf09/sscf/wiki)
This open-source project is the result of the collaboration of the Digital Business Model working group of Platform Industrie 4.0 with the MIT Alumni Environment, Energy and Sustainability Network, and based on an academic whitepaper on Sustainable Supply Chains and Data Spaces: https://hdl.handle.net/10125/103080.
Here we need to explain our definition of sustainability. Often the term sustainability is used with an exclusive focus on the environment and missing the other 2 dimensions of sustainability: social and economic. You are surprised? If yes, please have a look at the definition of the Triple Bottom Line (https://online.hbs.edu/blog/post/what-is-the-triple-bottom-line) that started the sustainability movement over 30 years ago, or the definition of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (https://sdgs.un.org/goals). It is fair to say that organizations neglected the environmental and social impact of their activities for a long time but finding the balance has started.
To reflect all sustainability dimensions in an organization is something where Enterprise Architecture plays a key role as an enabler for strategy execution.
The Sustainable Supply Chain Framework (S2CF) contains the following components.
Sustainable Supply Chain Framework – Overview
As you can see it adds a little bit more of an Enterprise Architecture flavor to initiatives like Catena-X. Why?
The X-Projects focus on use cases that in turn have a focus on the exchange of data in global supply chains. It does not consider how Data Spaces and Standards have an impact on the business processes and technology landscapes of organizations. The S2CF takes the perspective of business process and technology landscape and integrates the X-Use-Case into broader business use cases. The Sustainability Reference Architecture consists of 3 levels:
- Industry 4.0 Use Cases
- Enterprise
- Supply Chain
The use case blueprints/reference models are modelled using ArchiMate, BPMN and UML and it is intended to provide those as downloadable models from the GitHub site in the future, hoping that many people will contribute to this open-source initiative. Modelling the first use cases, has shown some architectural notation gaps in the industrial/automation space. The use cases reflect solutions, so the goal is to combine solution and enterprise architecture in the framework.
The S2CF also includes existing reference models from the Industry 4.0 ecosystem, e.g. sub-models for the Asset Administration Shell, used to describe Digital Twins from a data perspective, the Catena-X technical architecture and how to connect it to the internal digital landscape, as well as business value that can be generated beyond financial measurements, especially around the environmental and social dimension of sustainability. Here is a high-level overview of the Sustainability Reference Architecture, as part of the S2CF.
Sustainability Reference Architecture– Overview
Case Study: FMCG player
An international food manufacturer used its digital transformation program not only to consolidate its ERP landscape and move to the Cloud, but also have the required digital capabilities to support business model innovation and customer satisfaction. Some examples include the use of sensor technology in the plant to have real-time quality checks for milk, the use of sensors in taps in restaurant to be able to offer “beer as a service” or using connected coolers, to trigger automated restocking.
Before the digital transformation there were only solution architecture artifacts available and those were focused on technology. As part of the project, the 1000+ page PPT deliverable of a Big Four describing the business operating model, was integrated with the SAP blueprints, delivered by the Global System Integrator. Therefore, the organization gained transparency, from the business processes all the way to the technology implementation in the business system and automation environment.
In this case the need for Industry 4.0 enabled the creation of a holistic Enterprise Architecture function, which was sponsored by the supply chain director. As a side note: The IT function, including architecture, was moved out of the responsibility of the CFO to the COO, showing that architecture and technology was not a cost center, but a business capability creating value for the organization.
Summary
The need for Industry 4.0 technologies and business models can be an opportunity for Enterprise Architecture to move into a more strategic role and closer to the operational business, where the money is made. Finance, HR and other central functions are often in the focus of EA, but this is not where the success of a company is shaped. This of course will put many Enterprise Architects out of their comfort zone of IT and the office floor, but the shop floor offers the opportunity for Enterprise Architecture to create business value and shaping a truly integrated EA, combing the business, IT and OT.
About the Author
Peter Klement has been helping organizations for over 25 years to generate business value from digital technologies. His current focus is on Industry 4.0, where he is also active in different industry associations to shape technology standards and provide thought leadership. He has worked with organizations in all 5 continents and was living on 3 continents. His global professional network allows him to find the help his clients need to be successful with their digital transformation initiatives. Peter has an MBA from the MIT Sloan School of Management and a Master’s in Computer Science from the University of Applied Science in Munich. Within the MIT Innovation Network he is currently working on an open-source project called “Sustainable Supply Chain Framework” (https://inovia-solutions.com/sustainable-supply-chain-framework-s2cf/) that looks how architecture and genAI can help to accelerate the development of digital solutions, while at the same time improving their quality.
