German

The trilateral cooperation of Platform Industrie 4.0, Alliance Industrie du Futur and Piano Impresa 4.0 is intended to jointly advance the existing digitisation processes in line with the European idea. The trilateral cooperation focuses on three core topics, which are worked on in three joint working groups:

Standardization and reference architecture models. 

Common standards are essential for a digitised industry. Therefore, the first working group identifies relevant standards, coordinates standardisation efforts, works on the harmonisation of an administrative shell and finds ways to integrate SMEs in the field of standardisation. The group benefits from the achievements of the French-German working group.

SME involvement and testbeds. 

To make digitisation more accessible to SMEs, the second working group  collects and links application examples from all three countries, disseminates and completes Industrie 4.0 scenarios, and promotes an international network of testing infrastructures.

Political support.

Industry needs favourable framework conditions in order to benefit efficiently from digitisation. The working group therefore exchanges best practices from political regulations and programmes in various areas and levels and coordinates common positions of the three countries at European level as well as international forums.

The first cooperation talks between the three national initiatives were held at the high-level conference "Digitising Manufacturing in the G20" in Berlin in March 2017. Since then, a joint action plan has been developed, in which various measures and planned results have been identified. On June 20, 2017, the plan was approved by the Cooperation Board at a first joint meeting in Turin, Italy. Experts from industry, science and politics from all three countries are now working continuously on the three core topics.

In the working group "Standardization" chaired by Germany, the basic structure of the management shell for Industrie 4.0 was described and the first preferred standards were summarized in a 65-page document. With this work result, the technical-organizational framework conditions can be developed throughout Europe in order to implement the large number of necessary Industrie 4.0 sub-models in a coordinated manner.