Leveraging Asean Factori 4.0 Project Platforms and NB-IoT Cellular Communications for Research and Development Activities

The European project Asean Factori 4.0 aims to develop the teaching of modern automation technologies as part of the Industry 4.0 concept. This paper proposes to use the automation hardware platforms developed in the project framework for research and development purposes. In particular, it proposes to use cellular radio frequency communication technologies to exchange data between the PLC and the sensors and actuators system. It shows that NB IoT technologies are suitable for this type of application and in particular for low energy consumption. It introduces the concept of a virtual PLC as well.