Virtual Assistance In The Context of The Industry 4.0: A Case Study At Continental Advanced Antenna

The Industry 4.0 (I4.0) paradigm comes as a direct action by the German government to improve the industrial production process, by enhancing the ability to take action during the process and produce customized products, while maintaining the mass production industrial context. The I4.0 solutions rely on cybernetics systems that can enhance the users’ decision-making. Some technologies are particularly suited for this purpose, including data science combined with context sensitive applications and virtual assistants (VA). These types of user application can provide information and features according to the user’s context, thus acting proactively and foreseeing the user actions. In this work, we partnered with Continental Advanced Antenna – a manufacturer of radiofrequency devices for the auto industry, to further develop the concept of a VA to assist the production management. A prototype was built to interact and keep the production management team up to date regarding the ongoing execution of the production plan.