Towards a DevOps Approach in Cyber Physical Production Systems Using Digital Twins

Abstract

Nowadays product manufacturing must respond to mass customisation of products in order to meet the global market needs. This requires an agile and dynamic production process to be competitive in the market. Consequently, the need of factory digitalisation arises with the introduction of Industry 4.0. One example of the digitalisation is the digital twin. Digital twin enhances flexibility due to its adaptability and seamless interaction between the physical system and its virtual model. Furthermore, it bridges the gap between development and operations through the whole product life cycle. Therefore, digital twin can be an enabler for the DevOps application in cyber physical production systems as DevOps aims at merging Development and Operations to provide a continuous and an agile process. This paper analyses the use of the digital twin to enable a DevOps approach of cyber physical production systems (CPPS) in order to create a fully integrated and automated production process, enabling continuous improvement.