Digital Twins Minimizing Time to Market
Digital twins are revolutionizing operations throughout the entire product life cycle, enabling companies to save time, reduce costs and enhance product quality. By streamlining product development and optimizing maintenance processes, digital twins have become a game-changer for businesses striving for success.
Virtual representations of physical products
Advancement in computing power and the rise of artificial intelligence have enabled digital twins to thrive, offering virtual representations of physical objects. By combining static and dynamic data, digital twins simulate the actual environment of physical objects with accuracy. The object can be existing, or future products, manufacturing processes or other key elements within a company. Additionally, the complexity of the object can vary but is generally divided into three categories: a single component, a system, or an entire product. Companies often begin their digital twin journey with single components and later expand to include entire products.
”A virtual representation of a physical product enhances efficiency throughout its life cycle”
Utilizing digital twins in product development is highly beneficial, as tests can be carried out virtually. This significantly reduce cost and lead time in the testing process by e.g. decreasing the number of prototypes required and the personnel involved during the testing phase. Furthermore, leveraging digital twins throughout the entire product life cycle enhances both revenue streams and operational efficiency. Digital twins empower firms to advance in the aftermarket by enabling predictive maintenance, which optimizes services and increases spare parts sales. Predictive maintenance can also be applied to manufacturing processes, increasing production capacity and efficiency.
Enhancing product quality
Applying digital twins significantly enhances product quality for three reasons. To begin with, they enable companies to conduct a wider variety of tests, as hazardous or extreme scenarios are more feasible to simulate in a virtual environment. Additionally, the reduced cost and time of conducting virtual testing allow for more tests to be performed, resulting in more accurate outcomes. Furthermore, the elimination of physical prototypes in virtual testing facilitates earlier testing within the product development cycle, allowing for comprehensive analysis at the component, system, and product levels throughout the entire process.
“Substantially reduce the costs and time of physical testing”
To succeed with digital twins, several challenges must be addressed. First, ensuring clear and structured data collection is critical, especially given the dynamic nature of data from diverse sources. Without a robust approach to organizing and synchronizing data, the potential applications of digital twins will be limited. Second, overcoming silo-thinking within organizations is a significant challenge. Establishing cross-functional collaboration is essential, as insufficient communication and cooperation will impede the successful implementation and utilization of digital twins. Finally, developing and continuously monitoring well-defined maintenance processes is vital, as keeping models and data streams updated throughout the product life cycle is crucial for achieving long-term success.
Minimizing time to market
Through utilizing digital twins, products can be brought to market faster, at lower costs, and with higher quality. This technology reduces the need for physical testing and allows for real-time optimizations, improving efficiency and performance.
