Pedro Filipe Cunha

Pedro Filipe Cunha is currently Professor of Advanced Manufacturing Technologies and Operations Management, in the Mechanical Engineering Department at Instituto Politécnico de Setúbal, Portugal (Polytechnics Institute of Setúbal/School of Technology (ESTS). He is currently the Director of CENI – Centro de Integração e Inovação de Processos (Centre for Integration and Innovation Processes) and his fields of research and development are concerning Production Planning and Logistics, Collaborative Networks, Development of New Business Models for Products and Services, Modelling and simulation of manufacturing system, Systems integration and Process improvement. He has been involved as member, in several international and national scientific and professional communities or associations. The CIRP – International Academy of Production Engineering Research and AIM – European Academy on Industrial Engineering are two important international originations in which he has been contributing with his activities, including being Chair of international conferences, like the 3rd CIRP International Conference in “Digital Enterprise Technology” in 2006, the 46th CIRP International Conference in “Manufacturing Systems” and the 39ª Conference AIM – European Academy for Industrial Management” in 2017, and also as member of various international conferences Scientific Committees. He has been involved and coordinating different R&D projects and he is author and co-author of more than 40 scientific publications, including scientific papers, books chapters and books. He has been contributing as a reviewer and as editor at well recognized international journals, being examples the International Journal of Computer Integrated Manufacturing, Procedia CIRP and the CIRP Journal of Manufacturing Science and Technology. The link with the community has been promoted through different type of education activities and projects. Relevant projects has been developed for industrial companies and organizations, being only a few examples SECIL Group, Volkswagen-Autoeuropa, Cluster of Competitiveness Engineering an Tooling (https://www.toolingportugal.com) and PRODUTECH – Production Technologies Cluster (https://www.produtech.org/).

Abstract:

Title: Design, Developing and Implementing Cyber-Physical Systems – A perspective based on some Portuguese’s initiatives

The actual environment in which industrial companies are operating today is increasingly demanding due to the high level of uncertainty and the need to keep high level of operational performance. Therefore, the capabilities to visualize the processes and the different flows is essential for the analysis and evaluation of opportunities for improvement. Improvements must be designed and implemented based on paradigms such as process digitalization, interoperability, efficiency, changeability, sustainability and considering the human factors. Many of those paradigms are closely related with the theme of Industry 4.0 and their implementation requires a correct understanding of production systems dynamics and the opportunities for improvement or innovation. In fact, the concept of Industry 4.0, driven from the use of new technologies to support processes, will strongly contribute to revolutionize the way companies, supply chains or production networks are managed. Mainly it will introduce new engineering practices and organization or methods for operations execution and control, as well as it will promote new opportunities for cooperation between human beings and human beings, human beings and systems, systems and systems.

With the aim to support companies to proceed with fundamental changes in terms of technology and organization, we propose a methodology in which the status of a company should be evaluated and the work of designing, developing and implementing cyber-physical systems should be done involving the whole organization and its different management levels. The methodology we propose intends to answer different questions such as: Is a company prepared to move forward with the new paradigms introduced with industry 4.0? How can the company exploit the enormous potential that technology can bring? Which characteristics or functionalities should technological solutions  have to satisfy company needs?

The reflection that we propose to present about these themes will be made presenting projects and initiatives in which we are participating in Portugal, typically involving SMEs.