Integrated product-process modelling for platform-based co-development

Changeable manufacturing and platform-based co-development of products and manufacturing systems are becoming increasingly relevant for industrial manufacturing in order to respond to volatile markets, increased product variety and shorter product life cycles. However, in order to conduct platform-based co-development, it is necessary to manage the relations between the product domain and the manufacturing domain. This paper proposes an approach and meta-model for developing company-specific ontologies, which can be used for modelling the portfolio of components, processes and equipment and their interrelations as a basis for co-evolution. Developing such a model has implications for developing and utilising changeable manufacturing, which is also analysed in this paper.