In Bauma’s Innovation Hall, where the Machines in Construction (MiC) 4.0 booth sits, attendees are faced with this dilemma: that construction machinery manufacturers each have its own “digitization model.” This costs users time and money.
Launched in 2019, MiC 4.0 is a working group founded by the German Construction Machinery and Building Material Plants Association (VDMA) and construction companies in the German Construction Industry Federation (HDB). The group’s mission, according to its website, is to “develop a uniform, manufacturer-independent and machine-overarching digital communication” for the construction industry — one digital language.
“This standard is not working because it's too wide, too free for interpretation,” said Darius Soßdorf, a PhD in chemistry, who serves as the managing director of MiC 4.0.
Soßdorf said that the standard is so vague that different technologies often can’t agree whether or not a piece of equipment is turned on.
“If you send the data ‘I am on,’ the first manufacturer says, ‘The ignition key must stick in,’” he said. “The second says, ‘Oh, the radio or air condition must be on.’ The third says, ‘No, the engine must running.’ And the fourth says, ‘Oh, it depends on the largeness. Is it a big or a small machine. And I say, ‘Unbelievable,’ and the customer says, ‘Oh, very good approach.’ We need one manufacturer, independent and machine, overarching understanding of a machine condition.”
MiC 4.0 has 137 members from eight European countries. It works to develop solutions regrading data, data format and data transmission, as well as the transmission of International Organization of Standards-compliant data.
Construction equipment in the U.S. doesn’t all share the same digital language, either. Manufacturers like Caterpillar, Volvo, and John Deere, which is a MiC 4.0 member, often produce machines that communicate data, including engine hours, fuel usage, location and diagnostics, in their own formats, on their own platforms.
Like in Europe, there is a movement to fix this in America. It’s called ISO 15143-3 and it’s also referred to as AEMP 2.0. Developed by the Association of Equipment Management Professionals (AEMP), this allows data from different manufacturers to be shared in a common format.
Many manufacturers in the U.S. support this to some degree, and software companies offer platforms that aggregate data from multiple brands. However, not all data is shared equally. While basic data is usually standardized, full interoperability hasn’t caught up, yet.
Soßdorf said that having one digital language in the construction industry should be a global goal.
“And together, we come to common solution, once again, a common digital language, a common understanding of interpretation of meaning of data,” he said.
