Method for selecting Digital Twins of Entities in a System-of-Systems approach based on essential Information Attributes

In the manufacturing domain the topic of the Digital Twin is of growing interest, in particular its integration into the company’s own processes. Although the potential is undisputed, essential questions remain unanswered when it comes to the implementation. Many users find it difficult to weigh up efforts and benefits involved in the creation. Digital Twins can be built for any entity of a system, including those that are composed to ‘System-of-Systems’. However, is it really necessary to create a separate Digital Twin from a factory level down to the smallest screw? On the one hand it would require massive resources to build fine granular models and establish the necessary data flows. Especially small and medium sized enterprises (SME’s) are not able to provide these ad hoc. On the other hand, depending on the situation, such a high effort is not necessary for every use case. In this paper, a method is presented that supports potential users, especially SME’s, in the selection and implementation of Digital Twins. Essential information attributes that are of significance in answering the question above are considered as evaluation criteria at decision points. The applicability of the method has been tested on the basis of three use cases with the aim of reducing inefficiencies in planning and control tasks of material flows. The goal is to demonstrate that implementing Digital Twins in the own company does not have to be an all or nothing decision.