Industry 4.0 and Industrial IoT (IIoT): What Do They Bring to a Factory?

Industry 4.0 refers to connecting machines, sensors and software in production to make data-driven decisions. Industrial IoT (IIoT) is the technical foundation of that connection: collecting data from field devices and moving it to higher-level systems. The digital factory is the overall picture in which that data is used in production planning, maintenance and quality processes.

What it brings to the factory

• Visibility: live machine status, downtime reasons and production counts on one screen.
• Efficiency measurement: measuring the sources of downtime and losses so they can be improved.
• Maintenance: planning maintenance before failures using temperature, current and counter data.
• Traceability: a record of which product was made with which parameters.

Where to start?

1. 1
   Pick one question

   Start with one clear question such as "Why does this line stop?". Trying to collect everything scatters the project.

2. 2
   Find existing data

   Status bits, counters, alarm logs in the PLC and drive data are often enough to start with.

3. 3
   Check network and communication

   Determine whether machines are on a network and which protocol (PROFINET, Modbus TCP, OPC UA, etc.) they can provide data with. Older machines may need an additional communication module or gateway.

4. 4
   Start small, then expand

   Once you get results on one machine or line, move on to the others.

ELKAR collects status, counter and alarm data from your existing PLCs and transfers it not only to the HMI but also to SCADA, MES and cloud-based systems. We carry out the programming, communication and commissioning work together on site.