How will we live?

Transcription

1 techforum THE THYSSENKRUPP TECHNOLOGY MAGAZINE How will we live? Megacities in 2030: between castles in the air and pollution of the air. Three scenarios for the future of the city NEW GAME Open innovation inventor Henry Chesbrough on the free flow of ideas NEW CLOSENESS Collaboration, not separation: humans and robots work hand in hand NEW DRIVE e-mobility Competence Center develops highly integrated drive axle for electric vehicles

2 Portal THE NEW MULTI ELEVATOR CUTS THE AMOUNT OF SPACE REQUIRED BY UP TO 50 % The team at the Advanced Robotics Lab in Liechtenstein need only one week after a brainstorming session to present an initial proposed solution for the use of a robot in production. We show you where this high speed comes from on page 22. AND INCREASES PASSENGER CAPACITY BY AT LEAST THE SAME PROPORTION. Learn more about the world premiere of MULTI on page ,000 Companies with more than employees currently account for 35% of research and development spending. The fundamental changes in the innovation process are the subject of the interview on page 38. AROUND 500 STAKEHOLDERS IN THYSSENKRUPP TOOK PART IN THE COMPANY S FIRST SUSTAINABILITY PULSE CHECK. MORE THAN 60 PERCENT OF THEM REGARD INNOVATIVE AND SUSTAINABLE PRODUCTS AS A TOP ISSUE FOR THE GROUP. We report on the findings of the survey on page 44. By using digital twins, thyssenkrupp Bilstein is able to cut the development period for new damping systems to less than 2 years. Why this is so important is shown by the report on page 46.

3 FOREWORD Dear readers, Growing complexity, as well as frameworks, markets, and customer requirements that are changing with increasing speed: these are the reasons why agility is becoming more and more important for companies. It is vital to open structures, accelerate processes, take decisions more quickly, and move even closer to our customers. One thing that represents agility in technology and innovation, in particular, is the thyssenkrupp Innovation Garage. On this platform, we are working to develop new ideas at high speed and to swiftly put them into practice to such an extent that we can reliably determine their prospects of success in the market. Typical features of the Innovation Garage are high degrees of freedom for our employees, as well as the almost complete absence of traditional hierarchies. In the Innovation Garage, employees from all parts of the Group come together and form interdisciplinary teams. The ideas come from the collective know-how of thyssenkrupp as a diversified industrial company and directly from the creativity of the groups of workers with their wide mix of skills. In the Innovation Garage, the teams learn to set aside old ways of thinking and to give free rein to their imagination. You can read more about this new approach to agile innovation in this issue of techforum. However, agility is not another way of saying we have no plan. Of course, we also need to have an idea of the general direction, visions, and aims of our innovation. This is why we are using the Foresight process to ask how the world around us might develop in the future. In our cover story, we focus this time on the future of megacities, with three Foresight scenarios showing different possible paths for future development. They also make clear how thyssenkrupp, as an international technology group, can have a noticeable positive impact on the environmental footprint and the quality of life of future megacities. Alongside our established development processes, open innovation is an important piece in the puzzle of our innovation ecosystem. Here, we have succeeded in securing an interview with the US economist Henry Chesbrough, the man who coined the concept of open innovation and has published several books on the subject. I wish you an enjoyable read. Dr. Reinhold Achatz, Head of Technology, thyssenkrupp AG Illustration: Bianca Classen thyssenkrupp techforum

4 Contents 08 Megacities in transformation: How will people live in 2030? What does a city for dozens of millions of people need to look like? 06 Short Cuts One platform for everything Competence center for 3D printing Elevator factory in Pune Ford award for thyssenkrupp Cover story 08 The future of the city Three scenarios on the theme of Upgrading megacities 28 Electric drives will own the future. Daniel Fritsche and his team are driving this topic forward Photos: Quirin Leppert (2), Marcus Simaitis; Illustration: Skizzomat/Marie Emmermann 16 World premiere in Rottweil The new MULTI elevator starts trial operations 20 Light and easy With InnoCity, thyssenkrupp is building intricate bridges to the future Projects 22 The robot revolution Flexible team players these are the robots of the future 25 Working with Albert In Florange, a robot is an accepted member of the workforce 28 Startup with electric drive thyssenkrupp is developing a highly integrated drive axle for electric vehicles 32 Solar system 2.0 The new blue.cruiser is now on the move even more sustainably 04 ThyssenKrupp techforum

5 Panorama 34 Free space for ambitious plans At the Innovation Garage, thyssenkrupp employees make new ideas market-ready in the shortest possible time 38 Connecting smart people An interview with open innovation inventor Henry Chesbrough 22 Teamwork with robots: New ideas are emerging at the Advanced Robotics Lab 42 YouTube for the factory tech tube is a video-based knowledge database from the worker s perspective 44 Feedback from stakeholders thyssenkrupp has conducted its first Sustainability Pulse Check 46 Digital twins Virtual models are moving into the development of damper systems 48 Research for more efficiency A team in Dalian is supporting Chinese automobile makers 50 Living in a plant Habitable biostructures from the garden center 38 Visionary Henry Chesbrough advises newly diversified companies to embrace open innovation thyssenkrupp techforum

6 Preview Short Cuts One platform for everything A milestone in digital transformation: thyssenkrupp is integrating the machine pool in its materials division with the new digital platform toii, which enables devices to communicate directly with each other. The choice of name by the Materials Services business area is a twofold play on words. First, it is IIoT, the acronym for Industrial Internet of Things, in reverse. Second, its sound is reminiscent of that of the word, toy, and this indicates that connecting a very diverse machine pool to existing IT structures is now child s play. Toii was developed by company experts in the Software Engineering division and tailored specifically to conditions in Materials Services. The business area s machine pool is extremely complex. The machines perform a wide variety of tasks, come from a large number of manufacturers, and vary in age. Thanks to toii, it is now possible to integrate band saws Integrated: Machines like this tube laser are being connected to the new digital platform and bending machines, mobile objects like cranes and forklifts, and complex production facilities like complete longitudinal and lateral slitting lines, as intended in the IIoT. The digital platform facilitates both the exchange of data and communication by machines with each other, as well as communication between machines and IT systems. In this way, processes can be planned and coordinated with each other optimally and flexibly, across locations and worldwide. Another great benefit of the platform is simple data analysis. What was produced when, and in what quantity? Where is maintenance due, or where is a problem developing? What additional materials need to be delivered? The system answers all these and many other questions by not just gathering data, but also analyzing it. The results are available at the click of a mouse, clearly presented, and easy to understand. Competence center for 3D printing thyssenkrupp has opened a new TechCenter for industrial 3D printing in Mülheim. This investment is of great strategic importance to the Group, as the additive manufacturing market is expected to triple to 18 billion euros worldwide in the next four years. This is the ideal time for us to make our entry, says technology chief Reinhold Achatz. We already have several product ideas at the patenting stage. The new competence center is on the site of the thyssenkrupp Group subsidiary Presta and launched in September with two printers that can produce components made of metal and plastic. The initial aim is, in a similar manner to a startup, to approach the new technology flexibly and to work through the learning curve as quickly as possible. In the long term, it is planned to turn the competence center into a production site that will manufacture components from a variety of materials for customers in sectors including aviation, mechanical and plant engineering, and metalworking. Technology of the future: 3D printing is on the verge of a boom 06 thyssenkrupp techforum

7 New elevator factory in Pune thyssenkrupp Elevator has inaugurated a multifunctional factory for the production and distribution of elevators in the Indian city of Pune, which also includes a modern training center. On an area of two hectares, the company is able to make 6,000 elevators a year with immediate effect, and this capacity can be increased to 10,000 units as required. Demand on the subcontinent is high: according to estimates, in 2020 India will have almost 60 conurbations, including two of the world s megacities in New Delhi and Mumbai. Increasing urbanization means India is one of the fastest-growing elevator markets in the world. Modern production processes enable thyssenkrupp to support the fast-growing Indian construction sector, which is being driven by the vigorous pace of urbanization in the Indian subcontinent. At the same time, the new plant contributes to thyssenkrupp Elevator s goal of manufacturing 95 percent of its products close to their market, locally and regionally. Another key aspect of production close to the market is that it fosters and develops local talent. For this reason, at the same time as the opening of the production plant, a new training center for maintenance and service technicians is also being inaugurated, to support several Indian government programs to improve regional services and corporate efficiency. This training will reflect the growing digital transformation of thyssenkrupp Elevator: mixed reality, virtual reality, and simulation models will increasingly be included in practical training content and methods. Production plant and training center: thyssenkrupp Elevator aims to support the Indian construction sector from Pune Ford award for thyssenkrupp Successful partnership: Dr. Karsten Kroos (center) receives the award from Ford in Dearborn The US car manufacturer has honored thyssenkrupp with the World Excellence Award for being one of its best suppliers worldwide in The award in the Special Recognition category, which is given to suppliers that have distinguished themselves with outstanding customer support and development, went to the Group s steering business. Dr. Karsten Kroos, CEO of thyssenkrupp s components division, received the accolade at the Henry Ford Museum in Dearborn, Michigan. Ford is one of thyssenkrupp s most important customers in the automotive industry. The first business links between the Ford Motor Company and the thyssenkrupp Group date back to the beginning of the previous century. For several decades, the Group s components division has supplied the automobile maker with steering columns, steering shafts, springs and stabilizers, crankshafts, and camshafts. During this period, thyssenkrupp has received many awards from Ford in individual markets and regions. In the past fiscal year alone, the company produced several million steering components and systems for Ford s biggest model platforms. The car manufacturer is supplied here by thyssenkrupp plants in the USA, France, Liechtenstein, China, and Mexico. thyssenkrupp techforum

8 Cover story Upgrading MEGACITIES Between paradise and prefabrication How will megacities look in 2030? This question has been examined by thyssenkrupp in its Foresight process. This has resulted in three scenarios that describe completely different developments from a green metropolis to a bulwark against the forces of nature Text: Christian Buck Illustration: Skizzomat / Marie Emmermann Mayor Wu loves these visits. Once more, a large group of his counterparts from Europe and the USA have come to Hongtsiu to marvel at this rapidly growing business metropolis in Southeast Asia. There is, indeed, no shortage of reasons to do this, for in just a few decades a largely unknown city of five million inhabitants has turned into a megacity that is home to 25 million. The city s leaders have also succeeded in shaping its breathtaking growth sustainably and offering Hongtsiu s residents a quality of life that is admired worldwide. This is why mayors from Los Angeles, New York, London, Paris, and other former major cities have come to China today to learn about the recipe for Hongtsiu s success. Sustainability is our top priority, Wu tells his guests. And this is no mere exercise in lip service: we actually examine all investment projects for their impact on 08

9 the environment and our residents quality of life. From their viewing platform at a height of 450 meters on one of the city s newest skyscrapers, the 14 mayors who have traveled here can see for themselves what the Green first! maxim means in practice: not only between the individual buildings but also on many of the stories and roofs of the neighboring high-rises there are lush green spaces full of trees, bushes, and flowers. It is almost as though the city has been inseparably interwoven with parkland in three dimensions. Is your sustainability politically ordained or the result of genuine demand from the public? the mayor of Chicago asks. Wu loves this question and responds with a satisfied smile. It is both, he says. Policymakers have realized that we have to operate more sustainably, and the public have enthusiastically followed this lead. However, this is not purely the result of taking pleasure in good deeds. The government understood the need to combine the common good and self-interest: for many years, goods and services have carried green points informing consumers about their sustainability. The more green points an item has by comparison with a rival product, the less it costs. This has led to a fundamental change in consumer habits, Wu says. Sustainability has, so to speak, entered our inhabitants DNA, with absolutely no loss of comfort or prosperity. The visitors had already noticed this in the city s road traffic. No one in Hongtsiu seemed to have their own automobile anymore, as car-sharing and public transportation were the norm. But that was not all: other things in the city were also used communally wherever possible even kitchens. After all, possession is very limiting, Wu explains. In our sharing economy you can rent an Italian kitchen, for example, if you feel like pasta, or a French kitchen if you want a chateaubriand on your plate. We share everything that it A much-admired model: In Hongtsiu, sustainability and quality of life go hand in hand thyssenkrupp techforum

10 Inseparably interwoven: City and vegetation merge seamlessly together thyssenkrupp techforum

11 Cover story Upgrading Megacities Scenario one Sustainability is the top priority for government and public alike makes sense to share. What lies behind this, though, is not a romantic notion of common ownership. We are simply ensuring, in a manner regulated by a market mechanism, that we use our limited space with maximum efficiency. By the way, this evening we are going to cook and eat together in an original Chinese kitchen. Humans and nature in harmony Hongtsiu also trod a new path in construction at an early stage. Much of the public infrastructure, such as transportation routes and power plants, is now underground, where it no longer disrupts harmony between humans and nature. For the city s spectacular buildings, intelligent materials with a perfect environmental footprint and the capacity for self-restoration are used, as the government realized at an early stage that this is the most important tool for sustainable construction and deliberately promoted innovation. We were one of the first cities in the world to opt for automated construction with robots and 3D printing, Wu reports. And instead of constantly putting buildings up and then pulling them down, we are pursuing bionic growth our buildings grow in accordance with our needs. Buildings are made of intelligent materials with a perfect environmental footprint and the capacity for self-restoration. Here, too, market principles have prevailed: it is mainly private investors who are active in Hongtsiu, as they have recognized that sustainability is also beneficial for them economically. For now, the bionic buildings of Hongtsiu are still fiction. However, it is perfectly possible that they will be towering up into the sky in many places, especially in Asia, by around 2030 if the S.I.M. City UNLIMITED (Sustainable & Safe, Innovative, Market-driven) scenario developed by thyssenkrupp experts at Foresight workshops in Singapore becomes reality. After the future of work in production and last-mile urban mobility, megacity upgrading was the third topic in the Foresight series, which the Group is using to make early preparations for possible developments in about 20 years time. By comparison with today s megacities, with their 10-million-plus inhabitants, future conurbations could have even larger populations in China, for example, they are already thinking about urban clusters with more than 100 million inhabitants. As a technology group operating worldwide, thyssenkrupp is able to offer new products and services that will have a noticeable impact on the environmental footprint of future megacities. With its Elevator Technology, Materials Services, Steel Europe, Industrial Solutions, and Components Technology business units, the Group is a significant supplier of steel and other innovative materials for the construction sector, a leading producer of mobility solutions such as elevators, an important partner for the cement and building industries, and a developer of new solutions for urban energy supplies. Our aim is for this to continue in the future. However, as no one can predict with precision what will happen in the next few decades, in the Foresight process thyssenkrupp always develops several scenarios that describe a variety of developments. For instance, people in the future may 11

12 Cover story Upgrading Megacities not be living in the near-paradise of Hongtsiu but in the equally fictitious Chengoho, which features in the Penthouse or No House scenario. Above the clouds In Chengoho, the investor Li Shu is just now walking onto the roof garden at the top of his skyscraper and letting his gaze wander over the city or rather, over as much of it as can be seen at present. Shu lives at a height of almost 1,200 meters, which means he is far above the cloud of smog that covers Chengoho on most days. Down below, in the blanket of haze, live people who have not been as lucky as Shu for, in this city, social status can easily be deduced from the number of the story on which a person lives. At the very bottom, the buildings are plain tenements, enveloped in permanent pollution and the relentless noise of a city that never sleeps. Higher, starting approximately from the 50th story, live Chengoho s middle class: not exactly luxurious, but much safer and more spacious than the accommodation available to the lower class. There is hardly any interaction between the different social strata. People do not merely live at different levels, as even transportation is organized hierarchically. Thanks to horizontal connections between skyscrapers, no one from up above needs to venture anymore into the dangerous tumult of the roads at ground level. Instead, traffic flows within the various levels. Beside Shu stands the journalist Linda Bergsson from Stockholm. She has come to Chengoho to write a portrait of this billionaire investor and to introduce her readers in Sweden to the alien world of this Asian megacity. Is it not rather unfair that you are able to enjoy fresh air up here while your fellow human beings down there are coughing in the smog? the reporter asks. Why? Shu responds with genuine incomprehension. We are a functioning market economy. Everyone here can make something of themselves, and the government, fortunately, leaves us completely in peace to do that. Indeed, policymakers did decide years ago to leave the city s future development largely to private investors like Shu. Construction work is done with processes and materials that have been relied on for decades and can be obtained cheaply. The result was a proliferation of larger and larger buildings, on top of which additional stories made of prefabricated components were simply added whenever they were needed and with no regard for aesthetics. This process is known mockingly by European architects as the Lego approach. This muddle is compounded by constant changes of ownership: as parts of a building often change hands after a few months, construction work is constantly in progress. Everywhere, places are being renovated, new space is being added, or façades are being smartened up and where it is no longer possible to create fresh living space by extending a building, wrecking balls come along to make room. Construction work is done with processes and materials that have been relied on for decades and can be obtained cheaply. The only obvious innovation is the transportation drones that carry materials to the top of the skyscrapers and have taken the place of traditional Scenario two Everyone does what they want. Cost-efficiency is key

13 The Lego approach: Additional stories made of prefabricated components are added as they are needed, with no regard for aesthetics thyssenkrupp techforum

14 Protection against floods: Neighborhoods on jacks sink into the ground as needed thyssenkrupp techforum

15 Cover story Upgrading Megacities Scenario three The state is responsible for everything including survival after natural disasters cranes. What part does sustainability play in your investments? Bergsson asks. For me, immediate cost-efficiency is key, Shu says. In other words, if you want to pay for the luxury of new materials or energy-efficient technologies, they are all available. It is up to everyone to decide for themselves. Equality means prosperity The authorities in Pongjong are facing completely different challenges from Li Shu s. Here, they are not concerned with investing as profitably as possible. Rather, the city s 40 million inhabitants are seeking protection from increasingly frequent natural disasters and are counting on central coordination of all activities here by their government. In the E2 City (Efficiency & Equality) scenario, there is no place for individualism or private investors. Having a home is not an expression of a personal lifestyle but a purely practical necessity for which the state takes responsi bility. It provides living space, which remains public property and is allocated to people. The person in charge of this is Elin Park, who, as Minister of Housing and Infrastructure, administers a government budget worth billions for the reconstruction and expansion of megacities like Pongjong. A glance at the numerous photos on the walls of her underground office shows where the money has been spent in recent decades. Uniform residential and office buildings are laid out in rows as far as the eye can see: in the government s view, there is no other way of achieving efficiency and durability. This explains why the words Equality means prosperity are also inscribed on the banners that hang over many façades. At this moment, Park and her experts are discussing the next major projects in and around Pongjong. In the south of the city, for example, it is planned to sacrifice a 70-year-old district to progress and to demolish it, with the surgical precision that has now become commonplace: in this process, robots dismantle the old buildings and recycle most of the materials immediately, at the scene. How many apartments are we going to build below ground this time? Park asks her assistant. About 80 percent of 5,000, so 4,000, the assistant replies. We have only a few residential units above ground. There, we are going to accommodate mainly shopping facilities and offices. This is a principle that has proven itself over the past 15 years: the standardized underground apartments offer the best protection when, as a result of severe climate change, the weather yet again turns wild and threatens the city with heavy storms and torrential rain. The latest generation of building complexes can be completely cut off from the outside world: as soon as the sensors detect an approaching storm, doors and windows are automatically locked and secured with steel roller shutters. Some engineers are even thinking about building neighborhoods on hydraulic jacks, which could be lowered into the ground when necessary. Of course, Elin Park herself understands that, in this way, they are combating only the symptoms, not their causes. But what are we to do? she murmurs to herself as she watches a dark cloud front on the edge of the city. At the moment, our primary need is to ensure that all the city s inhabitants survive the next natural disaster. Robots dismantle old buildings and recycle materials immediately at the scene. 15

16 Cover story Multi 16 Rapid ascent: The MULTI cabs move at up to six meters per second in the test tower

17 Shift in the shaft Since June, thyssenkrupp has been trialing the revolutionary MULTI elevator system in the test tower in Rottweil, thus opening a new chapter in the history of the elevator. It already has its first customer Text: Christian Buck One push of a button, and the revolution commences. Three, two, one Andreas Schierenbeck, CEO of thyssen krupp Elevator (TKE), gives the countdown. When he reaches zero at this event in mid-june, the great moment follows: by pressing on the big, blue button in front of him, Schierenbeck gives the elevator the command to take off. The cab gathers speed although it moves not upward but to the left, into the neighboring elevator shaft in the new thyssen krupp test tower in Rottweil. Horizontal movement rather than vertical this has never happened before in more than 160 years of elevator history. To be precise, one should say the movement is both horizontal and vertical, since the revolutionary MULTI elevator can, of course, also carry its passengers upward. The direction no longer matters, as the new system manages without something that was previously thought an indispensable part of an elevator a cable. For movement, it instead uses a linear motor that was thyssenkrupp techforum

18 Cover story Multi On the move horizontally: Thanks to its exchanger system, MULTI can switch easily... originally developed for the Transrapid magnetic levitation train. There, it is irrelevant whether the vehicle moves up, down, left, or right. MULTI opens up completely new possibilities for architects. In the future, several cabs will be able to be on the move in one elevator shaft. Then, when they reach the end at the top or bottom, they can very simply be moved sideways into a parallel shaft, where they can continue their journey in the opposite direction. This makes it possible, for example, to create closed, circular systems that can be adapted flexibly to current demand: when a lot of people are on the move in a building, a few extra cabs are just fed into the shafts. Buildings are increasingly becoming a kind of city built vertically, where they need flexible transportation systems like those of the metro, says Markus Jetter, Head of Product Development for Systems and Components at TKE. Speed alone will not be enough to surmount the challenges of future megacities. Thanks to a 50-percent increase in passenger capacity, the new technology promises shorter waiting times and a reduction of up to 60 percent in peak power MULTI is the key to radical change in the elevator industry Andreas Schierenbeck, CEO thyssenkrupp Elevator demand. The use of light carbon composites and the lack of a cable are major factors in this. Furthermore, in the future there will no longer be any height restrictions: thanks to the new drive technology, the cabs will be able to ascend as close as they like to the clouds or even pass through them completely. In this way, the new elevator technology is contributing toward enabling the high-rises of the future to extend even further into the sky. In Saudi Arabia, for example, they are building the first skyscraper that is planned to break the symbolic one-kilometer barrier. Global demand for MULTI is likely to be huge in the decades to come: even now, half of the world s population lives in cities, and this proportion is going to rise to 70 percent by the middle of the century. High-rises have a central part to play here, as they can make residential and office space available without their use of that space leading to the loss of urgently needed green areas but it will become increasingly important to transport the residents of the future megacities efficiently within buildings and between them. Currently, however, people usually spend more time waiting for the next Brilliant prospects: Andreas Schierenbeck is expecting global demand

19 ... from one elevator shaft to the other and continue on its way elevator than actually using it. Thanks to the presence of several MULTI cabs in the same elevator shaft, it is intended that passengers should in future never have to spend more than 15 to 30 seconds standing in front of closed elevator doors. However, despite the greater convenience, there are no compromises on safety: even now, elevators are the safest transportation system, and MULTI is no exception. The cabs multiple-drive and braking system and the proven safety control system of the TWIN elevator ensure that there are no accidents. MULTI provides practical proof of its effectiveness TKE has been trialing a fully functional 1:3 scale model of MULTI in Gijón, Spain, since November Now, the new elevator can provide practical proof of its effectiveness in the full-scale facility of the Rottweil test tower. Testing and certification of the technology started in three of the twelve elevator shafts in mid-june. In this process, the cabs race up or down at up to six meters per second. The exchanger, as it is known by the engineers, is also being checked thoroughly in the test tower: the linear drive and guide rails turn through 90 degrees, and it is this ability that actually makes it possible to switch between vertical and horizontal movement. If all goes smoothly, the new technology will be in use in real life in 2020, at the latest. The first customer for MULTI is the project development company OVG, which is building the East Side Tower in Berlin, adjacent to the Mercedes-Benz Arena. We are engaging consistently with intelligent technologies and sustainability, and we are always one step ahead of others as a result, says OVG CEO Coen van Oostrom. The forward-looking technology that MULTI represents is an excellent fit for us. At the world premiere in Rottweil in mid-june, the pioneering spirit was palpable after all, MULTI is the greatest leap forward in innovation since the invention of the elevator in the 19th century. Around 200 guests and representatives of the building industry had come from all over the world and were able to watch on a giant video screen as the MULTI cab started moving at Schierenbeck s command. The applause of employees and visitors rang in a new era in urban mobility. We are convinced that MULTI will change fundamentally the way that people move about, live, and work in their built environment, Schierenbeck said. It can reduce waiting times significantly and will ensure a substantial gain in the amount of usable space in buildings. MULTI is the key to radical change in the elevator industry. Home of the high-fliers The test tower in Rottweil is not just a research center for thyssenkrupp but also a new tourist attraction in the oldest town in Baden-Württemberg. The public viewpoint at 232 meters with its floor-to-ceiling windows, offers a spectacular, 360-degree view as far as the Swabian Jura and even all the way to the Swiss Alps, in ideal conditions. The test tower s height of 246 meters places it between the television towers of Stuttgart (216 meters) and Berlin (368 meters). com/en/ thyssenkrupp techforum

20 Cover story Innocity Where is traffic in megacities to be put? Modular elevated roadways could be the answer, as the InnoCity project shows Intricate bridges to the future Text: Axel Novak Space is in increasingly short supply in large megacities worldwide. The rapid growth of cities is posing serious problems to planners and authorities if residents are to stay mobile and business and commerce are to prosper. However, whereas in past decades the priority was to supplement urban transportation networks by building underground systems, today the promise of relief comes from moving in the opposite direction: more than 150 years after the world s first subway was built in London, airy steel structures could rise up in the future and create space for traffic. One example of this is InnoCity. In this project, thyssenkrupp is getting to grips with what society needs from modern urban planning. Innovative roadways on intricate, lightweight-construction steel structures combine special aesthetic qualities with practicability. At present, we are working out the potential of InnoCity with possible users, reports Dr. Lothar Patberg, Head of Innovation at thyssenkrupp Steel Europe. In parallel, we are in the process of resolving fundamental questions, such as, How long-lasting will the structures be? and How do we measure the economic value of such schemes? The innovation unit has been working on InnoCity for a few years, and the first roadway could be in place as early as next year. In some local authorities, it is being talked about as a solution for cycle 20 Market-ready: The first roadway could be in place as early as 2018

21 Photos: thyssenkrupp; Getty Images Light and easy: Intricate structures let as much light as possible through paths. The planning of cycle paths is a matter of supply, observes Andreas Cott, who is involved with InnoCity as a project leader in the Innovation team. People will use bicycles if the supply is there. This is why it is so important to bridge the gap in built-up traffic hubs by creating new roadways. This solution must not just offer maximum safety to all road users but also let through as much light as possible by the use of an intricate structure for the roadway. Conventional structures are very expensive Bridges made of steel or concrete have existed for a long time. They enable people to cross roads and rail tracks safely. How ever, such structures are expensive and take up a lot of space: planning and tendering processes and construction work using concrete have long presented major challenges to cities and municipalities, and the unsatisfactory results can be seen in many places today. InnoCity is different. Its long lifespan and the industrial production of its individual elements reduce the overall cost. Here, thyssenkrupp uses processes from the automotive industry, such as a modular, scalable construction kit of materials and production technologies. For instance, the roadway is composed of prefabricated modules that are bolted together on-site instead of being welded. Despite the standardized production process, the individ ual elements allow for each roadway to be adapted precisely to local conditions with a variety of support radii or gradient angles. A bionic optimization process enables engineers to calculate the structures and the distribution of loads for all vehicle types precisely. By virtually subdividing the assembly space into a lot of small sections, we can use the finite element method and bionic optimization to simulate the efficient use of materials, Cott says. The design of the supports was adjusted and structurally optimized on this basis. As the engineers used 3D production processes, they were able to develop lighter structures with conventional steel. Finally, digital elements such as sensors for counting traffic or for the automated collection of tolls could also prepare the roadways for the use of autonomous vehicles. To make this complex product market-ready, experts from the whole company are working together. InnoCity is not just a thyssenkrupp Steel Europe product, Patberg says. Other units, such as thyssenkrupp Elevator, are involved in it with their products and know-how, as is thyssenkrupp Mill Services with its expertise in steel construction. This is because it is only through a holistic approach based on state-of-the-art technologies that it will also be possible to ensure seamless mobility in the cities of the future. thyssenkrupp techforum

22 Projects HUMAN ROBOTS Robots with feeling Simple repetition of processes is a thing of the past; the future demands flexibility. At the Advanced Robotics Lab, a young team are working on the robot revolution, much to the excitement of potential users Text: Christian Buck Photos: Quirin Leppert Very precisely, iiwa clasps the cable conduit and moves his fingers up to the plug at its end. As soon as he has reached it, he shakes the small plastic component until he has firmly taken hold of it. Now, the plug has to be inserted into the socket of a control unit. He makes a slight turning movement toward the target, carefully inserts the plug, and then gives it a gentle shake until the plug slowly enters the socket and is finally in place. Then iiwa again grasps the conduit and carefully presses it into a fastening clip on the steering gear. Everything is in place job done. Anybody who observes iiwa at work could almost think he was human, as his actions and movements so closely resemble those that production workers would make in performing this operation. However, iiwa is not a human but a one-armed lightweight robot that the experts at the Advanced Robotics Lab in Liechtenstein are using to work on new applications for these intelligent machines. The word advanced has a very specific meaning here. Today, we use robots mainly for handling parts in production work. This is about the precise repetition of processes, explains Andreas Münster, who is in charge of the laboratory. In the future, though, we also want to use them for value-adding activities for example, for inserting plugs or in joining processes. However, this will require new capabilities. In the future, it will no longer be enough to constantly repeat the same process tirelessly and with micrometer precision. Instead, robots will have to learn to deal with uncertainties and to respond flexibly to feedback from the process. For example, iiwa does not know the location of the plug that he needs to insert into the socket, Münster says. That is why he first looks for the cable conduit with his two steel fingers and then runs them along it until he reaches the plug, Münster explains. Pressure sensors signal to the robot when it has caught hold of something and whether the force used to insert it into the socket was great enough. Cameras are not used here, and this means iiwa s actions are slightly reminiscent of those of a human who has to perform a task blindfold and who feels their way by using the feedback from their fingers. Out of the cage For production work, the use of sensitive robots promises lower costs, better quality, and more flexibility. Cooperation between humans and machines, too, will change fundamentally, because sensors now 22 thyssenkrupp techforum

23 Helping hand: The YuMi robot is fitted with new gripping tools

24 Projects HUMAN ROBOTS Workshop atmosphere: Sebastian Schädler (left) and Andreas Münster (center) prepare the iiwa robot, which is extremely flexible thanks to its seven axes (right) enable modern robots to take account of their surroundings. If a human comes too close to them, for example, they simply stop moving. This means they can now be let out of their cages to work with humans in production. Alongside these sensitive robots, therefore, the team s second focus is on collaboration between humans and robots. Collaboration is the final stage in a development that starts with robots working in isolation and then goes on to coexistence and cooperation with humans, Münster says. A human can intervene in the process at any time, while the robot simply carries on working this is our top priority. Together with his team, Münster is working on turning the robot revolution into reality at thyssenkrupp. Interest within the Group is high. He regularly meets potential users for workshops to evaluate scenarios for the use of robots. In this process, Münster s coworker Sebastian Schäd ler, who is driving the implementation of concepts and programming at the Advanced Robotics Lab, discusses requirements with production planners and colleagues from the Group s plants and works out ideas for solutions. At the beginning, we leave out many details of the assembly process, so that we do not get bogged down in technical details during our concept studies, Schädler explains. In the future, we also want to use robots for value-adding activities. Andreas Münster, Head of the Advanced Robotics Lab One idea has already been put into practice. In Florange in France, Albert is now an integral part of the workforce (see report on page 25) and very skillfully assembles sealing rings in sensor housing. The idea for this dual-arm YuMi robot naturally came from the Advanced Robotics Lab. Three more projects are currently being implemented. Speed and flexibility are the hallmarks of the Advanced Robotics Lab in Liechtenstein. The young team have two robots available to them for their experiments. In addition, developers at the neighboring thyssenkrupp training workshop can at short notice produce parts themselves or have them made by a 3D printer. If, despite this, there is still something missing, they can obtain standard items like aluminum profiles on the spur of the moment and adapt them with simple tools, or sometimes they use materials from model construction to enable them to make a gripper or clamping device as quickly as possible. The control software for the robots is likewise created through teamwork within a few days; the team have just noted on a board how iiwa s seven axes need to move for the latest project. This work calls not for sophisticated engineering but for fast, pragmatic solutions for example, when special modeling clay and screws have to be used on a robot s gripper to enable it to handle sealing rings. With rapid prototyping, we can present our partners with a first version within a week after the brainstorming session, Münster says. This is perfectly adequate for assessing its prospects of success. This approach also prevents great ideas being rejected too quickly. After this, it takes a few months before a robot is actually in use in production where it can then prove that humans and machines can work together very well as a team. 24 thyssenkrupp techforum

25 Projects HUMAN ROBOTS Successful integration Humans and a machine are working hand in hand, without cages separating them: in Florange in Lorraine, the robot Albert is part of the team and accepted by employees as a colleague Text: Bärbel Brockmann Albert does not need to have a break, go home in the evening, or take a vacation. He never leaves his workplace and never sees daylight. He performs his job quickly and extremely precisely, around the clock. Albert is not a human but a dual-arm robot. His workplace is thyssenkrupp s Florange Sud production facility in Lorraine. Albert is deployed there in the production of steering gears. However, Albert is no ordinary industrial robot. He does not stand at the conveyor in a line with others, shielded from his surroundings by high steel cages. Instead, he sits without any barriers on a base no bigger than a stool. His task is to fit a wafer-thin sealing ring, called an O-ring, onto the rim of a curved sensor housing that will later cover a steering gear. To do this, with his left arm he lifts a round steel housing, about 15 centimeters high, out of a box, and with his right arm he takes the thin sealing ring off a rail. Now it gets difficult. Albert has to pull the ring apart with his two gripper arms and fit it onto a milled groove a task that requires a lot of skill and precision. Laurence Taillefert has been working with Albert from the beginning. In the past, she had to fit the O-rings onto the sensor housing herself a terribly fiddly job that demanded a lot of concentration. Now, she does Albert s preparatory work, which includes making sure all the necessary components are in the right place at the right time. At first, I was nervous, because the robot is very fast, but now we work very well together, the young woman says. Above all, she has less stress, because she no longer has to do the unpleasant jobs. Always having to keep to the prescribed rhythm was tiring, but now that the robot is doing this, I am not under that great time pressure anymore. Tireless: The robot Albert lifts a housing with its left arm, and with its right it takes an O-ring, which it fits onto a groove. Humans keep it supplied with material thyssenkrupp techforum

26 Projects HUMAN ROBOTS O- rings are wafer-thin sealing rings that seal the sensor housing on the steering gear The robot works at a faster rhythm than a human, it does not get in a tangle, there are no rejects, and there is no downtime. In short, productivity goes up. A cap for Albert Albert is actually called YuMi at least, that is the name under which the lightweight robot is marketed by its manufacturer, ABB. However, no sooner had it been installed than someone put a cap on top of it as a joke. Then one colleague said it now needed a name, too. Finally, they all agreed on Albert. Thierry Hassler smiles as a foreman recounts this tale. For the head of automation at Florange, there can be hardly any better proof that the robot is accepted by employees. This could not be taken for granted. At first, there were reservations among the workforce, especially regarding safety. For example, what would happen if someone accidentally came too close to the robot? This could easily come about, as the robot is working in the very middle of the team. We involved colleagues from the beginning. We discussed each step with them and asked every one of them about their concerns, and then we gradually worked through these issues, step by step, Hassler says. The safety concerns have now been dispelled, too. If anyone comes close to Albert, he slows down. If he is touched, even gently and on any part of him, he stops. To achieve this, some extra development effort was required. This is because, on the one hand, the robot is equipped with everything that makes it capable of collaborating it has a soft skin, joints with no sharp edges, and a motor current measurement system in its arms. This has the effect of stopping the robot when it comes into contact with anything, because more power is then needed. However, it is only its programming by the user

27 Photos: thyssenkrupp We involved colleagues from the beginning. We discussed each step with them and asked every one of them about their concerns. Thierry Hassler, Head of Automation at Florange that makes sure there are no collisions or injuries. This was the task of project leader Christophe Keller. He had not only to check that the robot could place the rings on the sensor housing but also to guarantee the safety of its human colleagues. Direct cooperation between humans and robots is a wholly new technology. There are not yet many people who are expert in it, he says. But why do this at all? Would it not be simpler to lock this small robot away in a cell, too? That would be much too expensive, Hassler explains. If we wanted to have protection for a robot cell like the Direct cooperation The programming of Albert makes sure that there are no collisions with humans and no injuries as sealing rings are placed on sensor housings. This means Thierry Hassler can move close to the robot without problems and does not have to be protected by a cage. This innovative use of a robot in production was developed at the thyssenkrupp Advanced Robotics Lab in Liechtenstein. More ideas are currently at the implementation stage. one here, that would cost an extra few thousand euros. After all, he says, you would need not only the protective grille but also safety sensors and a door plus more sensors for that, to show whether it was open or closed, or working normally or faulty. In addition to higher productivity, the key advantage of robots that work side by side with humans is flexibility. There is no need for lengthy changeover times for different tasks they merely have to be programmed differently. If we want to stay competitive, we have to become more flexible in the future, says Andreas Münster, who is in charge of the development of innovative production technologies in the production-planning area at the thyssenkrupp steering plant in Liechtenstein. Two years ago, he started thinking about how robots could be used to help create more flexible and productive workplaces. At around the same time, Hassler saw lightweight robots in operation at the Hanover trade fair and immediately recognized their potential. Naturally, they were both soon working as one. The first prototypes were created in Liechtenstein. Robots that had been bought were programmed to make them capable of performing a particular task. When this worked out, the practical trial in Florange followed. That, too, was successful, and the robot now has an established place in the production process there. One more robot is due to be put to use for a joining task in the fall. It comes from Kuka and will likewise work in the immediate vicinity of humans. Unlike the YuMi from ABB, which can handle weights of no more than 500 grams, the new one will be able to manage up to 14 kilograms. This, though, is only the start. Our medium-term goal is to use such robots in more workplaces, especially at new plants. This will lower our investment costs and make us more flexible, Münster says. In France, persuading the team to accept their next robot should be easier, as colleagues at Florange Sud have for a long time given Albert a good rating for successful integration. Their coworkers in other production areas can also see Albert at his workplace, except that he will no longer be wearing a cap for safety reasons. thyssenkrupp techforum

28 PROJECTS ELECTROMOBILITY Going live: Team leader Daniel Fritsche is aiming to become a system supplier of e-axles with his new solution Startup with electric drive A highly integrated drive unit is currently being created in Liechtenstein. The team behind it started work only in mid but aim to present the first prototype as early as next year Text: Christian Buck Photos: Quirin Leppert Standing inconspicuously on a wooden table in the workshop is a cylinder made of separate steel sheets, hollow inside, and with a profile composed of lots of small grooves. Copper protrudes from this gray block with a diameter of around 30 centimeters and creates an attractive contrast. At first glance, this heavy lump is not much to look at, but great expectations rest on it. The cylinder is the stator of a new electric motor that thyssenkrupp is developing in Liechtenstein and that is expected to open up new possibilities for the company. Its purpose is to produce a strong magnetic field to set the rotor in motion. That moving part of the e-motor lies just a few meters away on another table. The new stator has many distinctive features. The first is the special geometry of the sheets holding the copper, which are intended to contribute to creating optimum magnetic flux. Another is the copper wire itself, which protrudes from the cylinder in the form of stretched, rectangular blocks and is processed further to make a special type of winding wire. The regular-shaped blocks are packed extremely tightly into the stator, creating a strong magnetic field. It is also relatively easy to connect their ends together. Above all, however, they can be automatically inserted into the stator and interconnected this is intended to lead to lower costs and reproducible quality in subsequent series production. Until now, winding copper wire to the highest standards for electric motors has been predominantly the preserve of humans. thyssenkrupp employee Rainer Domig, a veritable master of his art, is at this moment sitting in the workshop, patiently filling another stator with copper coil in the conventional way. It will take him several more hours until the elaborate network of wires is complete. Then, the decisive test will follow. The motor with conventional winding will compete against the new drive developed in Liechtenstein. It will then be demonstrated on the test stand whether the new technology and the specially shaped sheets in the stator generate more power than the traditional technology. In theory, 28

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30 PROJECTS ELECTROMOBILITY this should be the case but ultimately, of course, it is the measurements that will decide. If everything goes as calculated beforehand, the team will have reached an important milestone. At the end of this journey it is planned to have a new, highly integrated drive axle for electric vehicles that includes apart from the electric motor a transmission and power electronics. Additional components, like inductive charging for the battery, could be added later as extra functions. The development team started work only in mid We are a true startup within thyssenkrupp, Daniel Fritsche, Head of the e-mobility Competence Center, says. We have built up the team and the workshop in a very short space of time. His colleagues are sitting at their computers in the offices in Liechtenstein, simulating things such as the electromagnetic field in the motor. Their aim is to optimize the efficiency of the machine, its mechanics, and its heat dissipation. It is always necessary to find a compromise between the mechanical, electrical, and thermal properties of an electric motor, Fritsche Series production of the drive unit could begin at the end of 2020 explains. This is why we are working so hard on improvements with colleagues from completely different disciplines. Diagonally opposite the office rooms is the competence center s electronics laboratory. This is where Katja Stengert works on the power electronics. The room is full of measuring equipment, and on the work table lie boards with electronic circuits. There are always two of us working here, Stengert reports. Owing to the high voltages of several hundred volts, a colleague is always in the room with me to help in an emergency. Power electronics mediates between the battery and electric drive by using high-performance transistors to supply the motor with the correct dose of energy. Technical solutions for this already exist, but a circuit designed specifically for the new drive axle promises more efficiency and advantages in series production for example, in the amount of space required for installation. As well as Stengert, there is a team in Budapest working on the electronics and software for the system. Modular approach It is planned to have the first prototype of the drive axle available in mid-2018, and series production could begin at the end of With this, we are also aiming to become a system supplier of e-axles, Fritsche explains. In addition, we will, of course, continue to supply our customers with individual components for electric motors, such as rotor shafts from 1 Drive components 1. The rotors rotate in the electric motor s magnetic field and create movement in the e-vehicle. 2. The stator produces a strong magnetic field that causes the rotor to rotate. At present, series production that meets the highest standards remains a task for experts such as Rainer Domig. 3. Power electronics measures out the flow of energy to the motor. Katja Stengert in the electronics laboratory is working on an individual solution for the drive unit. 030

31 thyssenkrupp Camshafts. The timing of this development is no coincidence. We have reached a turning point, with a number of vehicle makers changing their platforms and gearing them to e-automobiles, Fritsche says. We are deliberately pursuing a modular approach in our development, because this is the only way that we can achieve attractive costs with We have reached a turning point, with a number of vehicle makers changing their platforms and gearing them to e-automobiles. Daniel Fritsche, Head of the e-mobility Competence Center smaller medium-term volumes and reflect our customers varying business models. Many areas of the Group are contributing to the project s success. thyssenkrupp Steering is providing its expertise in electronics and e-motors, and thyssenkrupp Camshafts is sharing its know-how in the production of rotor shafts. Our company can make full use of its economies of scale here, Fritsche says. For example, with thyssenkrupp Steel we have comprehensive expertise in electrical steel, and in relation to vehicles we have some technologies that place us at the very front for example, in steer-by-wire technology. We also have the experience of our colleagues at thyssenkrupp Systems Engineering, who will be able to design the facilities for future series production. Between now and then, the team in Liechtenstein will have more improvements and measurements to deal with. If they are successful there, the unassuming metal cylinder from the competence center should be providing eco-friendly power for many electric vehicles in a few years time. Highly integrated electric drive axle Technical data 170 kw 120 kw 225 Nm 1 min. 800 Volt Peak output Continuous output Torque > 15,000 revolutions Voltage Water-cooled 2 3 thyssenkrupp techforum

32 PROJECTS Blue.cruiser The new solar system In our collaboration with Bochum University, the focus is on sustainability. With support from thyssenkrupp s sustainability experts, the students have analyzed the impact of various components and made the thyssenkrupp blue.cruiser even more environmentfriendly than its predecessor 1 6 Infographic: C3 Visual Lab mm 1760 mm 4960 mm 1 Solar cells 2 Tubular frame 3 Back seats 4 Vegan leather The blue.cruiser uses solar cells made of silicon, which improve the environmental performance significantly. The new cells produce CO 2 emissions that are more than 50 percent lower as compared with the preceding model. With the larger surface area, even more electricity can be generated; this can be fed into the grid or used to power other devices. The very light tubular frame made of ultra-high-strength steel partially replaces hard-to-recycle carbon fiber. Together, the CO 2 emissions of the two materials have been reduced significantly even though the blue.cruiser is larger, and therefore heavier, than its predecessor. litecore sandwich material was used for the back seats of the blue.cruiser. This steelpolymer material consists of two very thin steel sheets, between which there is a plastic core. It is almost as light as aluminum and much more eco-friendly. The upholstery on the front and back seats is made of pineapple leather, the fibers of which are obtained from previously unused pineapple leaves this conserves resources. The roof and trunk are lined with cotton leather, which serves to insulate the electronics and save weight. 32

33 Linen and bio-resin 6 Balsa wood 7 Battery 8 Steel wheel For the first time, parts of the interior trim have been made with linen (for covering) and bio-resin (for laminating), instead of carbon fiber. These two materials were used, for example, for the door trim and the dashboard. They were also used in the center tunnel. Balsa wood is laminated into the fiber composite between layers of carbon to increase safety and stability. It is contained in the hood and floor. Balsa wood is also built into many anchor points. Without being immediately visible, it replaces the plastic foam core and contributes to reducing the overall weight. To insulate the cells electronics against heat, the battery box was covered with a layer of cork. In addition, cork is light, water-repellent, and non-flammable. The wheels of the blue.cruiser were made of dual-phase steel, instead of aluminum. The weight level is roughly the same, but their production is less energy-intensive and, therefore, more environmentfriendly. The wheels are more resilient and are ready for series production. thyssenkrupp techforum

34 Panorama AGILE Innovation Nico Schön deals every day with bringing new things into the world. Schön, 30, works for thyssenkrupp Components Technology as Manager Innovation Strategy. This central department advises all business units in the Components Technology Business Area on matters relating to innovation. Schön is an automobile man: during and after his studies at RWTH Aachen University (industrial engineer in machine-building, majoring in automotive engineering), he worked for BMW and Audi and at the Fraunhofer Institute for Production Technology IPT. What appealed to him about the Innovation Garage was thinking in what if scenarios. Fast breeder for the next big thing 34

35 Conventional development channels are not always enough to bring pioneering innovations to market quickly. thyssenkrupp s award-winning Innovation Garage creates ideas that have what it takes to be a great success How we work: 10 principles that make a difference Text: Constantin Gillies Photos: Marcus Simaitis, Daniel Reinhardt, and thyssenkrupp 1 invest in chunks Anyone who buys a used automobile knows this uneasy feeling. Does no accidents really mean that, and how careful has the previous owner been with the vehicle? In the future, it will be very easy for the potential buyer to get a clear answer: they will click on an app and immediately see the vehicle s entire history. There, for example, they will read: 56,634 kilometers: strong vibrations on right front wheel, likely damage to suspension. The information for the app comes from sensors that can be built into all makes of vehicle in minutes. However, the system, known as CarValoo, was invented not in Zuffenhausen or Wolfsburg but in Essen. It was developed by a young 2 think fundamentally 3 look for mindset 4 build a purpose 5 think exponentially team from thyssenkrupp specifically, at the Innovation Garage. This program helps employees to turn a radically new product or service idea into a market-ready offer in a short space of time. Creating free space for breakthrough innovations We are creating free space for breakthrough innovations, declares Dirk Bartels, Head of Innovation Management at thyssenkrupp. The Garage aims to launch innovations that perhaps do not yet fit into the Group s portfolio but that have a chance of becoming the next big thing. Our engineering expertise and the usual development channels are not always enough here, Bartels says. Therefore, the Garage welcomes ambitious plans: if you have an idea with potential for the future, you can flesh it out here and put it into practice with a large degree of autonomy. You will receive support in putting together a Group-wide team, plus the necessary capital and all this within just six months. Some ideas are just so big that you have to get to grips with them at once, Ben Heydecke says with a laugh. Heydecke, 23, works in thyssenkrupp s shipbuilding division, which is based in Kiel and Hamburg. It is this very choice of locations that inspired Heydecke s Garage project. He had noticed that employees at different locations were often working on the same topics. Would it not be helpful to see what colleagues in different business units are doing and how this might help in your own work? Heydecke s Garage team has now put this vision into practice, in the form of an app called Myndpool. It works in a similar way to WhatsApp, Digital diary: The sensors for CarValoo can be installed in minutes. Then, an app records how owners treat their vehicles thyssenkrupp techforum

36 Panorama AGILE Innovation 6 GID: get it done 7 be rapid 8 use your senses 9 engage your users 10 enable, enable, enable Source: #how-we-work It doesn t feel like work if you are fired up by it. Ben Heydecke, Manager at thyssenkrupp Marine Systems and co-inventor of Myndpool except that you use the program to contact not friends but a digital concierge. It can understand both text and voice messages and is available around the clock. When you come out of a meeting, you can simply tell it quickly what the meeting was about it takes no more than a few seconds, Heydecke says, giving one example. In addition, the digital helper will occasionally prompt the user by itself and ask them, for instance, what their biggest success of the day has been. thyssenkrupp business units to whom Myndpool s makers presented their concept. This pitch is the first hurdle facing all the Garage innovators: they have to convince investors that they have found a problem that tk can solve. If they succeed in this, the team receive seed capital to develop an initial attempt at a solution, including prototypes, whether this is a physical device or a piece of software. They are then given several weeks to work on it before making a second pitch, where the investors are presented with the fleshedout innovation. If they are still convinced, the teams receive follow-on financing to make their product market-ready. Core task: find potential customers as early as possible With all these visions, however, the focus has to remain on the business. For this reason, at the earliest possible stage the Garage teams are expected to find potential customers who confirm their assumptions. The makers of CarValoo, the digital vehicle passport that records every rough Digital concierge: Myndpool regularly prompts its user and receives their input. An algorithm uses this to build up a knowledge atlas All this information is evaluated in the background by a self-learning algorithm. It identifies relevant topics and individuals and presents these to other Myndpool users as needed. The old name for this sort of thing was knowledge management, and it was complicated. Users had to laboriously enter details of their knowledge, with keywords. Myndpool, on the other hand, is knowledge management to go. You say something to the concierge, and it builds up a knowledge atlas completely by itself. It is a great idea and this was also the view of three investors from different contact with the curb, are planning to talk first to fleet operators. If they fit their vehicles with these devices, it could help them avoid expensive downtimes. The vision is that as soon as the system registers an accident, the likely damage can be calculated and contact made with a nearby repair shop that can immediately procure the necessary spare parts. They already have a first pilot customer, says Nico Schön, Manager Innovation Strategy at thyssenkrupp and a member of the CarValoo team. The first fleet tests could be running by These are extremely important, because it is only with large

37 Ben Heydecke has been working since July 2016 as a manager at thyssenkrupp Marine Systems in Kiel, a shipyard with a long history that makes naval surface vessels and submarines. There, Heydecke is responsible for both order fulfillment and the development of new products. Prior to this, he completed a dual studies work and study program at the Nordakademie private university, graduating as an industrial engineer. Heydecke, 23, describes the charm of the Innovation Garage in these words: It is about ideas so big that you have to get to grips with them now. volumes of data that the system can learn to draw conclusions about damage from one type of vibration alone. The team behind Myndpool are likewise out and about now, looking for customers for their knowledge butler. The ideal first user is, of course, thyssenkrupp itself, as the tool will be at its most helpful in large organizations with a global presence. If you were looking for an expert in virtual reality in Mexico, for example, you would need just to ask your cell phone and you would immediately be recommended a colleague in the relevant national subsidiary. The first outside customers that they want to attract, Heydecke says, are management consultancy companies and the sooner, the better. Speed is the top priority at the Garage, like in a real workshop. For this reason, the teams work in sprints blocks of work lasting one week at a time, taking place outside of thyssenkrupp offices. Three to four sprints are spread over a period of six months. Anything else that comes up is handled by the Garage participants alongside their day-to-day work. Is that not stressful? It doesn t feel like work if you are fired up by it, says Myndpool maker Heydecke. Incidentally, it is all part of the plan that the innovators should continue doing their normal jobs. The Garage is deliberately avoiding the creation of a biotope detached from the rest of the company. Only in this way can the spirit of the Garage spill over into existing projects, co-initiator Bartels says with conviction. In any event, the concept seems to be working: the magazine Capital recently gave the Innovation Garage its award for Best digital lab in German industry. It had examined a total of 100 such initiatives all over Germany. By the way, the innovation workshop itself is a team effort. Organizationally, it comes under the thyssenkrupp Academy, the internal continuing-training unit, but its leading figures and supporters are spread throughout the Group ranging from central Innovation Management to the individual business areas. The Garage s inventors have already come closer to their main goal of making thyssenkrupp more agile and innovative. The first ideas from the fast breeder are near to being market-ready. They have the potential to generate business in the next one to three years, innovation manager Bartels says happily. thyssenkrupp techforum

38 Panorama Interview We have to open up the fortresses of knowledge Knowledge is now more widely distributed, and innovation is happening more often in small companies. For the visionary Henry Chesbrough, this means the future clearly belongs to open innovation 38 thyssenkrupp techforum

39 Text: Constantin Gillies Photos: Marcus Simaitis A spring day in Essen: thyssenkrupp experts are discussing new approaches in research and development. With them is the US economist Henry Chesbrough, who introduced the model of open innovation in In this interview, he explains why companies will have to do more in the future to open themselves up. techforum: What does open innovation mean, and what is new about it? Henry Chesbrough: For a long time, the innovation process at big companies looked like a funnel. Many projects that were started by the research department went in at the top. Some of them were abandoned after a while, and others went on to the narrow part of the funnel the development department and at some point reached the market. This was all a closed system. Innovations came only from the company s own R&D department, and they were also placed only in their traditional markets. Open innovation means breaking with this principle and making the funnel permeable, so that

40 Panorama Interview ideas can flow more easily into the company from outside and vice-versa. I published my first book about the concept of open innovation in From this, you can see that it is not a new idea. However, open innovation is gaining in importance, thanks mainly to the growth in digitization. techforum: Why is this form of innovation better? HC: Because the large R&D departments of major groups, the old fortresses of knowledge, are losing a lot of their importance. This can be seen in the overall distribution of R&D spending. In 1981, large companies with more than 25,000 staff accounted for 70 percent of that spending. By comparison, small firms were rather insignificant at that time. However, this situation has altered radically. Today, the share of R&D spending accounted for by major groups is only 35 percent half what it used to be while small companies with fewer than 1,000 employees have a 22-percent share. We have a much more level playing field. Innovation today depends much less on a company s size. techforum: Why have small firms become more inventive? HC: First, technologies like the internet have made it much easier to access knowledge. Second, young firms now have much more venture capital at their disposal. In addition, universities have established much closer relationships with business in recent decades. More and more research is happening through cooperation arrangements between industry and academia. People like me, who come from industry, have found a home in the academic world. This would not have been possible 30 years ago. All these developments are contributing to a situation where knowledge is distributed more widely and innovation occurs more often outside of major companies. Look at the US pharmaceutical company Merck. Its R&D department conducts around one percent of all biomedical research. No single company, however large it may be, can Diversified companies like thyssenkrupp can also use open innovation within their group by exchanging ideas and cooperating across business areas. Their structure makes them virtually predestined to do this. dominate this field alone. For this reason, the management recently announced in a letter to shareholders that it planned to do even more to open up to outsiders, so that the company could tap into the remaining 99 percent of research. Bill Joy, the founder of Sun Microsystems, once summed it up in this way: Not all the smart people work for you. In other words, we need to find a way to get better at connecting our smart people with smart people in other places. techforum: How can a company find these smart people and their ideas? HC: Some companies now employ people known as technology scouts, meaning specialists who focus exclusively on tapping external sources of knowledge. For example, they read academic journals and keep their eyes open for interesting breakthroughs or maintain contact with renowned researchers. They also look at patent applications to find new and unusual ideas. In addition, many companies are intensifying their contacts with the startup scene, because this is where the business models and technologies of the future are increasingly emerging. One way to get there is to create a digital lab, where internal R&D staff are brought together with young companies to experiment together. This, too, is a good means of driving open innovation forward. techforum: But is it not legally complicated to use ideas from outside? HC: Intellectual property is certainly a major topic. Issues such as which idea belongs to whom and who has access to it have to be clarified. This requires new processes. Also, to be honest, it is especially hard to resolve intellectual property issues in the initial phase. However, a few rules have now been established. Let me give you one example. Assume thyssenkrupp develops a new technology with a startup. There could then be an agreement that the senior partner receives the exclusive right to use the innovation in automobile construction, while the startup can sell it in the medical sector or the insurance industry. techforum: You stress that open inno vation also works from within a company to the outside world. How does that happen? HC: Remember the funnel model. Many projects that start in a company s research department never reach the market. Open innovation means offering such projects to external partners or refining them with them. In addition, it can be worthwhile to share your own resources with others, as Amazon does. The company operates huge data centers to run its e-commerce business. Those centers are fully utilized in the run-up to Christmas, but certainly not during the rest of the year. For this reason, Amazon has started making its IT infrastructure available to other companies. In some cases, Amazon even hosts its rivals websites! By opening itself up in this way, the company gains two advantages. First, the fixed costs of the IT are spread over more users. Second, the organization is able to see huge volumes of data, from which it can learn. I could also imagine something similar happening at thyssenkrupp. It may be worthwhile to share your own data with other compa-

41 nies in order to gain access to their data in return. This digital raw material could be used to improve your own software and algorithms, as this is precisely what is becoming more and more important: data is increasingly forming the foundation for innovations, especially in the age of artificial intelligence. techforum: Does this mean open innovation is only for large groups? HC: No. German companies of all sizes have many patents. One approach could be to share with third parties proprietary technologies that you are not using yourself. Diversified companies like thyssenkrupp can also use open innovation within their group by exchanging ideas and cooperating across business areas. Their structure makes them virtually predestined to do this. techforum: More and more often, we read about companies that are again doing everything on their own, like the automobile manufacturer Tesla. Does this not run counter to the idea of open innovation? HC: You have to look closely at what is happening here. Tesla and other companies that are seeking to build self-driving automobiles are focusing on what is known as the end-to-end experience. In other words, they are trying to produce all the knowledge about autonomous driving in-house. Especially in a field where safety plays such a big part, this makes sense. In other business sectors, however, Tesla operates in an extremely open manner. For example, the giant battery factory that is currently being created in Nevada is being built in collaboration with Panasonic, because Tesla knows that the entire capacity will not be used up by automobile batteries alone. In this business area, therefore, they are practicing open innovation. techforum: Does open innovation work in all sectors? HC: There are certainly industries where open innovation is not so well suited. I could cite nuclear power as an example. This Henry Chesbrough I used to sell hard drives. This is how Henry Chesbrough describes his previous life, with a wink. In reality, the well-known American economist can look back on long experience in industry. In the 1980s he worked at the Quantum Corporation, a US hardware manufacturer, with responsibilities that included business development. In 1997 he moved to the academic world, becoming Assistant Professor at the Harvard Business School. In 2003 he presented the book that made his name: Open Innovation: The New Imperative for Creating and Profiting from Technology. In it Chesbrough describes how companies can gain an edge in innovation by opening up systematically to outsiders. Chesbrough, 61, now teaches at the Haas School of Business, which is part of the renowned University of California, Berkeley. is a sector that does not have either a lot of startups operating or much university research going on. This makes a poor foundation because, for open innovation to work, there needs to be enough knowledge present that can then flow. However, whether a company opens itself up also depends ultimately on its culture and an ecosystem of suitable partners. Apple, for example, makes considerable use of external research capacity and invests only five percent of its turnover in its own R&D at Microsoft the figure is 15 percent. techforum: Will the open innovation model prevail? HC: This is already happening. I introduced it in 2003, and it has developed into the leading innovation model in industry. Its advantages seem to justify it. This also applies to cooperation arrangements per se open innovation makes sense only if it results in advantages for both parties. thyssenkrupp techforum

42 Panorama Tech Tube YouTube for the factory In production work in the future, employees will obtain additional information from data glasses for instance, through the videobased knowledge database tech tube, which thyssenkrupp is currently testing Text: François Baumgartner The transition to electromobility, increasing quantities, the high complexity of parts, and many types of vehicle automobile manufacturers are currently facing major challenges. The same applies to production workers, who will in the future be deployed flexibly at a variety of workstations while still being expected to adhere precisely to all the requirements of the manufacturing process. thyssenkrupp System Engineering is seeking to support people in this new world of work and has, for this reason, developed the idea and vision of the Future Automotive Factory, which is digitally integrated and knowledge-based. An important tool in this factory of the future will be new applications from the realm of augmented reality (AR) such as data glasses that provide workers in real time with additional information about components, machines, or work processes. They are already being used in the training of new colleagues, and quality control is due to follow soon. We aim to use AR to boost productivity and ensure quality, says Dr. Matthias Hartmann, Head of Technology and Innovation at thyssenkrupp System Engineering. The tech tube project is making an important contribution here. From the worker s perspective The name is deliberately reminiscent of the well-known internet platform YouTube, where anyone can share their own videos with the whole world. thyssenkrupp is seeking to use this idea to produce a 42 thyssenkrupp techforum

43 Extended view: The data glasses are already being used in training, and quality control is due to follow soon of special projects at thyssenkrupp System Engineering. We can transfer this valuable knowledge to locations worldwide and document it accurately in the form of photos or videos. Wholly positive feedback Photo: thyssenkrupp The data glasses could soon become a standard feature of a specialist worker s comprehensive toolkit. Jens Stolzenburg, thyssenkrupp System Engineering video-based knowledge database from the worker s perspective a kind of YouTube for the factory, which will then be used within the company. Technologically, this is based on the video camera that is built into every set of data glasses. Whether it is for entire value chains, intricate production and work processes, or tried-andtested solutions to problems, we can use data glasses to record all production operations and always from the perspective of the person in production, says Jens Stolzenburg, who is in charge In this way, tech tube is intended to make sure that know-how from practical experience is available to all employees for example, for quality control in production. In the future, production workers will be able to access through their data glasses information that includes operating instructions, safety regulations, and support for using and maintaining machines and robots. They can also be used to facilitate communication among colleagues for instance, when a German-speaking employee has a problem with a tool or a robot. In such a situation, they could, for example, ask a Spanish colleague in another plant for a solution in real time, Stolzenburg explains. The ideal scenario is that the technology will translate the reply from the employee abroad either simultaneously or asynchronously. We are still working on that at present. The first tests have already been completed successfully. We are receiving consistently positive feedback from the test subjects who have already tried out the data glasses, Stolzenburg says. It could soon become a standard feature of a specialist worker s comprehensive toolkit. It is planned to make the application available in the most common languages. The rollout of the new data glasses could begin as early as next year. thyssenkrupp techforum

44 Panorama Sustainability Finger on the pulse How is thyssenkrupp s performance on sustainability being received? How do customers, suppliers, investors, and other stakeholders view the company? What are their expectations? The first Sustainability Pulse Check has produced important findings Text: Axel Novak Sustainability, performance, image, and strategy: thyssenkrupp has conducted a comprehensive online survey to gather feedback on its record and strategy in relation to sustainability. As stakeholders in the company, suppliers, customers, investors, academics, and representatives of civil society were able to give their assessment of the industrial group s alignment and focus in the first Sustainability Pulse Check. The internet portal was open for the whole of June to receive online questionnaires containing evaluations and suggestions for improving quality. The results are now available. The survey contains two core messages for thyssenkrupp. The first result is that survey respondents consider the company s overall performance, across all topics, to be decent. We are on 5.8 out of 5.8/10 points were given to thyssenkrupp by those surveyed for its overall record on sustainability a good mid-ranking position ten here, which is a good mid-ranking position, says Dr. Steffen Schwartz-Höfler, Senior Manager, Sustainability Strategy and Reporting. Of course, there is still plenty of room for improvement, but thyssenkrupp has managed to become much more sustainable in our stakeholders eyes. Just a few years ago, the company was still far behind in many surveys. However, there is a clear expectation from those surveyed that thyssenkrupp should see itself even more clearly as an innovative company with a claim to leadership on sustainability. Clearer positioning as a sustainability leader, to distinguish itself from the competition this is how one academic expressed his expectations of the company. Most important topic: innovations and sustainable products The second core message follows the same lines. It is that thyssenkrupp needs to position itself more clearly with innovative products. More than 60 percent of those surveyed regard 44

45 Environment, energy & climate Occupational safety and health protection Innovation & sustainable Human rights products Employer & working conditions Diversity Product responsibility Local commitment and responsibility Corporate governance & integrity Transparency & dialogue Longterm profitability innovative and sustainable products as a top issue for the Group. Above all, however, we are credited with great potential as a partner for sustainable solutions, says Daniel Schleifer, Senior Manager, Sustainable Value Chain. Also among the top issues for stakeholders are environment/climate/energy, governance/integrity, and long-term profitability. Other topics with a strong social element health and occupational safety, transparency, local commitment, or human rights and diversity are likewise seen as important for the Group. The Sustainability Pulse Check was presented and discussed within the company during the summer. In September there followed a Group-wide sustainability conference, and in November the Sustainability Committee will discuss the results at Executive Board level. In parallel with this, experts from the Group s specialist areas will develop concrete measures on the basis of the results. Our dialogue with investors has already been expanded on the basis of the Pulse Check, Schwartz-Höfler says. Top topics: The graphic shows the areas where those surveyed think thyssenkrupp should become active Interaction with stakeholders will also continue in the future. I was surprised, above all, by two things first, the high level of participation, with more than 500 people completing the survey, and second, their willingness to enter into a dialogue, Schleifer says, drawing his conclusions. Although it was an anonymous questionnaire, more than 70 participants actually gave their names, so that they could engage in discussion with us about our future focus. >60 % of survey respondents regard innovative and sustainable products as a top issue for thyssenkrupp thyssenkrupp techforum

46 Panorama Active Dampers Getting there faster Text: Monika Weiner Development times in the automotive industry are getting shorter and shorter. Digital twins of components are giving engineers a fresh impetus 46

47 We are able to reduce the development time to less than two years. Andreas Rohde, Head of Technology and Innovation at thyssenkrupp Bilstein The automotive industry has its foot on the pedal. New models are coming onto the market sooner and sooner. With some manufacturers, development times for new vehicle models are already below two years. To remain competitive, we, as a top supplier, have to get faster, too, declares Dr. Andreas Rohde, Head of Technology and Innovation at thyssenkrupp Bilstein. This is a major challenge, because the demands placed on suspension and damper systems, for example, are unchanged. They have to last at least 15 years in both summer and winter and on smooth freeways and dirt tracks alike. For two years, thyssenkrupp Bilstein has been focusing on digital twins in a pilot project, and this places it among the leaders, technologically. At an early stage, in parallel with the traditional development path, it creates virtual models that help its chassis experts to demonstrate and optimize the dampers technical properties. The data obtained in this way is fed into the traditional development process that runs in parallel, as well as into production planning this is Engineering 4.0. How ever, the digital twins cannot and are not intended to take the place of traditional tests, as these are still necessary and a legal requirement. Every new vehicle model and variant needs a tailored damper system, which has to be developed, applied, and tested. Although all these struts consist of a steel or air spring and a hydraulic shock absorber, the detail varies. It is necessary to match the technical properties to each vehicle, its size, engine power, and drive type and thus to achieve optimum driving comfort and dynamics. The digital parallel world reduces testing effort In the past, as a rule, all types of damper had to be put through every test from A to Z. A particularly time-consuming example of this was endurance testing, which replicates in a climatic chamber the stresses involved in driving 300,000 kilometers. Other time-guzzlers were the automobile makers traditional winter and summer trials, as well as chassis tuning, when thyssenkrupp Bilstein s technicians are present on the ground to fine-tune the dampers. These tests are still indispensable, but the digital twins mean we can now reduce them to a minimum, Rohde explains. His team work closely with vehicle manufacturers including Tesla, Porsche, BMW, and Daimler on the development of new models from the very beginning and have built up a digital parallel world step by step. While the real dampers are examined thoroughly in trial facilities and on test The demands placed on suspension/damper systems are considerable. They have to last at least 15 years in all seasons and even under the most severe stresses. The amount of time spent developing the components is similarly high. Digital twins could reduce this by up to 50 percent tracks, we use the virtual prototypes for extensive load simulations, he says. To make sure the results reflect reality 1:1, the engineers compare all the results from the computer with test stand measurements. This process creates a digital twin that serves as a reference model. For example, it enables variants intended for use in automobile derivatives of the same type to be developed and optimized. All that remains at the end is for the final prototypes to be built and tested. The aim is to save up to 50 percent of the time spent on the development process. And that is not all. In the future, the virtual models will also be able to supply all the essential planning and control data to the production facility at thyssenkrupp Bilstein. Thanks to the digital twin, this facility can be adapted at an early stage to produce the new dampers, and it is actually already able to supply the latest prototypes. The vehicle manufacturers, too, are benefiting from the new technology, since they are receiving the complete data on the damper systems as early as the development stage and are able to integrate this into their overall vehicle models. Thanks to the digital twins, we are able to reduce the development time to less than two years, Rohde concludes. This is improving not only our own competitiveness but also the automobile makers. thyssenkrupp techforum

48 Panorama RESEARCH TEAMS Race for the future Chinese automobile makers are working on more efficient engines. The new TechCenter for engine components in Dalian delivers the technology required Boom town: Dalian has attracted a lot of international companies Text: Mirko Heinemann T Photos: thyssenkrupp; Getty Images (2) a population Dalian, with of ty ci t or p he China s first, was one of on li il m ce 2005, x si of es (SEZ). Sin n zo ic om es special econ 00 employe p has had 7 d ea h er thyssenkrup lind shafts and cy of y et making cam a vari les here for ea cover modu g 2017, an ar n ri sp from urers. In ct off fa u ed an at m ar s was sep er automobile et m e ar n u e to a ew,000 sq has been hom measuring 2 it, en th ce ts, known nt. Sin e componen the main pla in g en r fo r t cente op and build e is to devel developmen os rp u p s It enter. as the TechC e. ployees com es prototyp ter s six em n dly ce ar t h en e m ar ce there The develop y itself. Sin e an p w m a, co in h e C th from within vant skills in with the rele Han, head s g st n li ja ia ei ec Z s sp in la any p ex s, from our ourselve the best staff ed trained them st li en e s and reenter. W ement team ag of the TechC an m ss ce to a team. and pro n together in w production ro g e av h. They trained them thyssenkrupp has invested around ten million euros in the new center, including state-ofthe-art CNC machines and analyzers. The focus is on refining the valve control the device that determines what quantity of the fuel mixture is sucked in and when, as well as when it is released from the cylinder again after combustion. In a combustion engine, the valve control is one factor that determines its efficiency, Han explains. As a result, camshafts made at the Dalian plant are up to 30 percent lighter than traditional cast or forged camshafts. This means they reduce fuel consumption and generate lower pollutant emissions. In addition, all the essential process parameters and geometric characteristics of the product can be monitored completely during assembly. Consequently, customers obtain an extremely high level of certainty in planning for their production. This point is especially important for attracting new customers. The TechCenter is creating six Team: The s e ye lo p m e come from ny the compa itself 48 thyssenkrupp techforum

49 products that mee t the specific needs of automobile manufacturers and that promise them an optimum solution, Han says. This requirement applies not only to the product that the supplier provide s but also to its integration into cu stomers manufactu rin g chains. The focus is on the regional market. Th e main customers are Chin ese automobile man ufacturers that are seeking so lutions to make th eir engines more economical and effi cient. The needs of auto mobile manufacturers in Ch ina are becoming in creasingly specific with regar d to requirements for CO2 and other emissions, Ze ijang Han says. T his is where we come in. Manufacturers are turning to us because they kn ow that we have th e necessary technology an d the relevant expe rti se. For thyssenkrupp, the TechCenter in Dalian is another step into a future that is char acterized by increasingly rapid change, since there is probably nowhere else in th e world where com pe tition among different drive syste ms is as intense as it is in China. On the one hand, th ere are increasingly efficient combustion engines, while on the othe r, electric mobility is being dr iven forward at high pressure. Metropolis: The city is home to more than six million people In Zeijang Ha here, beca n s view, there is n o contrad use in the iction future Da to develop lian will a compone ls o be able n ts that ca and electr n be used ic drives. in W hybrid and hubs e are spec, Han sa ialists in s ys. Thes h afts are neede e are com d in all ve ponents th hicles n electric au at aturally, in tomobiles cluding. Around te million n euros h ave been in ve the Tec sted in hcente r by thyssen krupp New valve controls promise more efficient combustion engines thyssenkrupp techforum

50 COLUMN Living in a building that is a plant Buildings from the garden center and bio-empathy: apartment plants form a symbiotic relationship with their residents My apartment has registered that I have come back from the office in a bad mood. Now it is trying to cheer me up. As I walk through the rooms, the floor directly under my feet remains a calm surface while, around me, it makes gentle waves and elegantly balances out all the furniture. Along the wall, I am pursued by a color sample in pastel shades curved asymmetrically, as was the fashion in the 1960s. After all, the apartment is familiar with my preferences and taste. Through a window I can see one of the residential plants opposite, where some young people live. They are constantly forgetting to water their living area, which has already turned very brown as a result. I am annoyed and consider writing a letter of complaint to the building management company. My apartment notices this latest lowering of my spirits and switches the window to frosted-glass mode, to spare me this disturbing view. Nevertheless, my mood remains dark. Our sensorily alert, habitable bio-structures constantly try to adapt to the needs and wishes of their residents, while, in return, their human beneficiaries have to make sure their living habitat thrives a symbiotic relationship. Wilted areas of residential vegetation are signs of problem residents or environments, as in the case of my neighbors. I would never treat my residential vegetation like that, and I can still remember clearly the day I bought the seeds at the garden center. In a few weeks, they turned into my house. Seed producers offer a wide range of bio-housing. There are cheap apartment plants where a balcony blossoms when the sun shines, and expensive varieties where the balcony lasts for a whole summer s evening. There are also differing degrees of bioempathy. Some green houses react only to a few simple, standard moods in their residents, but are cheap to buy. Luxury residential plants, on the other hand, are understanding, as helpful as an English butler, and as beneficial to your health as a good therapist. They also regulate disputes among neighbors through independent organic processes. For example, the building material responds to noise from an adjacent apartment by rapidly growing a layer of biological insulation. The concept of property as fixed, immovable housing dissolved long ago into something new, vibrant, and movable. In recent years, more and more building materials have become biological and, above all, living, growing, and flexible. First, genetic engineering and computer technology merged together, and then laboratories created plants with artificial intelligence that were sensorily fine-tuned to identify residents needs precisely. This development has a feature that is both an advantage and a disadvantage. Just as social networks function better the more personal information you reveal, living in a residential plant unveils its far-reaching, new style of comfort only when you are ready to form a symbiotic relationship with the object. Not everybody is at ease with this. My apartment has now managed to put me into a happier state of mind. Parts of it are edible there is a door frame for which I have developed a taste in the past few days, and I cut a plant fillet out of it for my evening meal. At the same time, I adjust the fertilizer setting so that the place from which I have cut my harvest will grow back in a short space of time. Thanks to this closeto-nature architectural style, I no longer have to take the garbage out. Instead, I simply feed it to the apartment, which gains nutrients and fuel from it. However, the extraordinary sense of well-being that residential plants can generate is also leading to new social phenomena. For instance, one case has come to light where a married couple got divorced because one half had fallen in love with the apartment as it blossomed so youthfully. Nothing like that could happen to me, because, like most people, I have learned how to rein in my residential plant s advances by, for example, bringing a bit of a bad mood home to it from time to time. Peter Glaser is an author and journalist. He writes for publications including the Neue Zürcher Zeitung and Technology Review. He won the Ingeborg Bachmann Prize in Illustration: Bianca Classen/Photos U3: PR/Cover photo: Quirin Leppert 50

51 May 2016 Portfolio Industry Agenda Shaping the Future of Construction A Breakthrough in Mindset and Technology Prepared in collaboration with The Boston Consulting Group How we will live Urbanization is one of the top trends of this century, so it is no wonder that concepts like smart city, smart buildings, urbanization, or sustainability are coming up more and more often. What lies behind this? What examples already exist to show how the cities of the future might look? The Urban Hub web portal provides answers stories from all over the world show what new technologies are being developed for the megacities of tomorrow and how experts and visionaries envisage life in such metropolises. Urban Hub Skyscrapers for vegetables The growing populations of our cities need not only sufficient living space but also a secure supply of nutritious food. In order to limit future land consumption and the environmental impact of food transportation, Dickson Despommier has developed the concept of the vertical farm. High-rises in city centers will produce the food on people s plates. The Vertical Farm: Feeding the World in the 21st Century Dickson Despommier Macmillan, Time for change The global urban population is growing by 200,000 every day. They all need affordable living space, a reliable public infrastructure, and a functioning local public transportation system. This also presents the building industry with immense challenges, which it can overcome with the help of digitization, new technologies, and innovative construction methods. This study by the World Economic Forum shows how the sector needs to transform itself to become fit for the future. Shaping the Future of Construction The World Economic Forum Harbingers of the future To find out what the megacities of the future will look like, you need to turn your eyes toward Asia. It is not just that new cities are towering up into the sky there for architects, these huge conurbations are also a test site for new construction concepts. The four films on this DVD examine the topics of Conquering the gaps, Countryside and tradition, Spectacular cultural buildings, and New city models. What they show is that it is in Asia that the cities of tomorrow are emerging. Cities of Tomorrow, four documentary films, ARTE edition Imprint Published by: thyssenkrupp AG, Corporate Function Communications, ThyssenKrupp Allee 1, Essen, Germany Responsible Editor: Bernd Overmaat (legally responsible for content), contact.techforum@thyssenkrupp.com Copyright: thyssenkrupp AG 2017 Reprints only with the publisher s permission. thyssenkrupp techforum is distributed using an address file stored through an automated data processing system. Information about thyssenkrupp can also be found on the internet at A digital version of thyssenkrupp techforum can be found at Publishing House: Axel Springer SE Corporate Solutions Project Manager: Katrin Meyer Editor-in-Chief: Christian Buck Art Direction: Christian Hruschka & Stefan Semrau (twotype design) Picture Editing: Birgit Kohne Printed by: Neef & Stumme premium printing GmbH & Co. KG, Schillerstraße 2, Wittingen, Germany ISSN: thyssenkrupp techforum

52 In the future, we will be able to make more efficient use of our facilities with flexible production concepts. This requires new robots that are sensitive and facilitate a new form of cooperation between humans and machines. The transition from mechanics to mechatronic systems with a high software content will change the world. For eight years, Andreas Münster has been working with robots. Initially, these were traditional industrial robots, but for the past two years he has been working intensively on latest-generation models. As team leader in the predevelopment of new production technologies, Münster, a mechanical engineer with great affinity for software, has one clear aim that humans and machines should work together closely in the future in the context of new production concepts. Page 22