Method for the development of an Asset Administration Shell in a product-driven modular production – realizing an active digital object memory

Production environments need to cope with increasing complexity due to changing customer demands. An approach is the use of Asset Administration Shells (AAS) to realize intelligent production assets within a modular production. In this research, we develop a method to integrate an AAS for an active digital object memory model (ADOMe) for a product within the production, based on specifications of the German Platform Industrie 4.0. The method entails six steps, starting with a description of the use case that needs to be implemented and implications for the current production before an information flow description is derived. Afterwards, the specification, modelling and implementing of the AAS can take place. This method is then validated in a prototypical implementation with the use case of remotely discharging a product within the manufacturing process. The benefits on the flexibility of the production system is then critically discussed and an outlook on further developments is given.