Framework and Capability of Industrial IoT Infrastructure for Smart Manufacturing

The Internet of Things (IoT) and smart manufacturing (SM) are mutually reinforcing. The establishment of IoT-based common facilities for SM is the premise of building SM system. Industrial IoT (IIoT) infrastructure for SM refers to common facilities based on IoT that support SM in industries or sectors, and plays a dominant role and faces severe challenges in the intelligence of SM. The infrastructure is independent of the products and production process in a specific factory. This paper develops conceptual and capability frameworks of IIoT infrastructure from a unified perspective of IIoT-related SM industries. These frameworks reflect relationships between IIoT and SM with in-depth relationships among basic facilities of IIoT infrastructure and lay the foundation of SM. In this paper the common characteristics and high-level requirements with respect to the different IoT layers of IIoT infrastructure are analyzed, and the capability framework and relevant capabilities of IIoT infrastructure are summarized according to the characteristics and requirements. In order to help service providers implement their systems to meet the needs of SM, the existing and newly developed IIoT infrastructure are integrated partially or in whole according to the intelligence level, so as to provide technical guidance for stakeholders to apply emerging ICTs to SM.