Volkswagen has opened a new IT facility in its Gläserne Manufaktur facility in Dresden, Germany, badged the Software Development Center Production (SDC Production).
As many as 80 newly hired IT specialists will be based there, and will focus on the Volkswagen industrial cloud. In the future the industrial cloud will link all 122 group-wide Volkswagen production facilities. The goal is to amalgamate all data, and in doing so, digitize all of production and logistics.
Martin Hofmann, head of IT for the Volkswagen Group, commented, “With the new IT development center in Gläserne Manufaktur, our expert knowledge will continue to grow; skills in important areas of technology will secure our future.”
Martin Dulig, Saxony’s minister of state for economy, work and transport, said, “I am pleased to hear of Volkswagen’s decision to establish a software development center in Saxony’s capital. The new unit strengthens the automotive and IT sites in Saxony. Intelligent software is becoming increasingly important in creating resource-efficient production processes.”
With the rapid development of the software industry, the pioneering role of TU Dresden in communication technology and the Dresden University of Applied Sciences (HTW), Saxony’s state capital has clear locational advantages. More than a third of the 220 specialists that will be needed in the medium term for the industrial cloud will therefore be working in Dresden.
As well as Dresden, Volkswagen experts in Munich and Wolfsburg will support development work. In Berlin, participating companies are planning a joint industrial cloud innovation center.
Thomas Popp, head of the Saxony state chancellery and official representative for information technology (CIO) of the Free State of Saxony, added, “All the ingredients for successful IT development meet in Saxony. Qualified specialists from universities, application-oriented research and the IT industry are of particular significance.
“The extraordinary level of commitment that Volkswagen has invested in the development center for the digital production platform in Dresden, as well as in the full renovation of the Zwickau factory for electric mobility, demonstrates the confidence in the Saxony site. The state chancellery welcomes the new IT developers of the digital ecosystem from around Dresden.”
Dirk Hilbert, mayor of Dresden, said, “I am delighted that up to 80 IT jobs are to be created in Dresden anew. This is also a sign of how the ICT sector as a whole is booming in Dresden, indeed in Saxony as well, and is making a major contribution to the economic success of Silicon Saxony with annual sales of around €15bn. And the new development in the transparent factory once again shows that Industry 4.0 in Dresden is no longer a dream of the future.”
The Industrial Cloud will bring together data from all factories and will enable smart, real-time control. For example, material flow can be organized more efficiently and delivery bottlenecks and process disruptions can be detected at an early stage.
The network is being established together with Amazon Web Services (AWS), while integration work is being done with Siemens.
