ETRI Develops 280km Remote-Control Smart Factory Technology

[Asia Economy Reporter Eunmo Koo] Domestic researchers have developed a technology that enables real-time remote control of smart factories located hundreds of kilometers away using 5G and wired networks.

The Electronics and Telecommunications Research Institute (ETRI) announced on the 16th that it successfully demonstrated a "ultra-low latency, high-reliability 5G wired and wireless network-based remote industrial Internet of Things service" connecting the ETRI headquarters building 11 laboratory in Daejeon and the Korea Institute of Industrial Technology smart factory in Hayang-eup, Gyeongsan-si, Gyeongbuk.

The distance between ETRI and the smart factory is about 180 km by car, but the wired network KOREN extends to 280 km.

ETRI combined its self-developed 5G wireless mobile communication technology with wired network technology to connect equipment within the factory and proved that equipment can be controlled in real time from a remote control center as if on-site.

The demonstrated services include remote real-time production management systems, remote real-time production robot control, real-time production equipment control and management using remote touch panels, real-time process monitoring using remote virtual reality (VR) devices, and remote process monitoring through wireless sensors.

A smart factory is an intelligent factory that automates work using robots instead of humans or controls various processes even when not on-site. To prevent damage caused by process errors when issuing commands remotely, communication delay must be minimal and data loss must not occur, as if commands were issued on-site. Although there have been cases of using 5G to demonstrate smart factories before, they used foreign equipment or technology and were mostly limited to real-time control of manufacturing equipment within the factory.

Bang Seungchan, head of ETRI's Communication Media Research Laboratory, said, "This technology will be used as an innovative tool to activate 5G smart factories across the manufacturing industry," adding, "We will do our best to activate the technology as soon as possible in cooperation with small and medium-sized enterprises."

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.