How do we measure the success of the FLASH-COMP solution?

The ambitious goal of our project is to create a quality control solution that uses artificial intelligence to help identify and remove defects during composite manufacturing processes. But how do we quantify the success of such a solution? This is the task of Work Package 7 of FLASH-COMP, which recently had its kick-off meeting to set out the work involved.

The aim of Work Package 7 – Zero Defect and Zero Waste Sustainability Assessment – is to define methods and tools to evaluate the effectiveness, reliability, and impact of the integration of FLASH-COMP monitoring and control systems developed for each of the use-cases.

For that purpose, validation protocols in terms of human, technical, economic and environmental aspects will be defined, and a sustainability assessment methodology will be carried out.

The work package is divided into four main tasks:

1. Economic, Green & Waste Assessment Framework (KPIs)

This task will focus on defining the main KPIs and related assessment methods to be used for validating the benefits brought by the different FLASH-COMP solutions in terms of manufacturing efficiency and greening effects.

First, a full evaluation of the use-cases will provide a baseline for the original manufacturing conditions as well as the operational requirements.

Life cycle inventories (LCI), in which all input and output flows from a system are quantified, will be carried out for each use-case to enable drawing of the technical, operational, environmental, and economic profile of the respective reference manufacturing route, and to identify major limitations. inefficiencies, and environmental and cost detractors. From this, target values for the KPIs will be created.

Dedicated validation protocols, based on innovative sustainability assessment methodologies (including LCA and LCC and social work-force aspects, e.g. user-friendliness of systems) will be issued. These protocols will ensure that replicable and standards-complying assessment procedures are applied within the assessment stages.

2. Product & Process Assessment: Eco-Efficiency and Sustainability

This task will assess the overall performance of the new manufacturing scenario developed for each use-case to validate the greening capacity of FLASH-COMP solution when implemented in industrial setups.

The analysis will be based on the multi-dimensional eco-efficiency assessment methodologies developed earlier. The interdependencies within the technical, operational, and environmental performance of each process will be analysed, assessing the influence of the new manufacturing conditions and strategies on the KPIs, following an iterative evaluation process.

Energy, material consumption, quality, defects/waste generated, and operation time are some of the factors that will be examined. This process will include data collection and analysis to extrapolate trends and assess the performance of the FLASH-COMP-based manufacturing scenarios in terms of the KPIs.

The reference manufacturing conditions and values gathered earlier will be used as a baseline to quantify the ‘greening’ effect and overall sustainability improvement induced by the implementation of FLASH-COMP solutions. Conclusions will be documented to be further exploited by end-users and technology developers.

3. Business Assessment: Digital Transformation Pathways

Business impact assessments of the FLASH-COMP solutions in the industrial cases will be implemented in this task in three phases:

• Definition phase: digital maturity assessment (e.g. DREAMY and Test Industry 4.0) methods and tools will be used to identify the strategic business impact of the project on critical business and organisational processes of the use-cases.
• Measurement phase: six main dimensions will be used here: product, process and platform from a more technology-oriented viewpoint; people, partnership, performance for a more business-oriented viewpoint. Digital transformation pathways (as-is, to-be) will be developed in the six dimensions above as a tool to constantly assess the impact of the project.
• Assessment phase: AS-IS, expected TO-BE and measured indicators will be compared, and a benchmarking analysis will be performed.

An online survey will be also produced to assess the business impact in other Zero Defect Zero Waste projects of the 4ZDM cluster.

4. Social Assessment: Human Skills Development & Training

A training program that considers operators’ profiles and skills development and competency gaps will be determined. The required skills and competences will be grouped into hard and soft skills.

Based on these learning objectives, learning modules for education and training will be defined. A work session will be carried out with the use-case leaders to validate the content of the learning modules and define related learning paths.

The best upskilling strategies for efficiently and effectively addressing the existing workforce and undergraduate students will then be defined. The combinations of learning strategies (face to face training, real case resolution, e-learning, webinars, coaching, conference, etc.) will be chosen depending on both the type of skills and competencies to be taught and the profile of the trainees. A beta-version with pilot sessions of the learning pack will be produced.