BAIC Trucks’ DT@iFactory digital twin smart factory begins operation

Beijing (Gasgoo)- On March 28, BAIC Group’s commercial vehicle arm, BAIC Trucks, saw its digital twin smart factory, namely the DT@iFactory, officially start operation.

Photo credit: BAIC Trucks

At the same time, the first new-generation digital smart heavy-duty truck, the i-Beijing, rolled off the production line at the DT@iFactory, and was delivered to its customer.  

The DT@iFactory is created from plant planning to equipment commissioning by using the virtual twin model for simulation. The automaker deployed tens of thousands of sensors in the physical factory, relying on data mirroring to reproduce the virtual factory, realizing the integration of IT (information technology) and OT (operation technology).

The factory is the industry's first to fully digitally connect the client, product, supplier, and factory together, ensuring an efficient and precise delivery in each step. Circling around workers, engineers, and suppliers, the digitally driven quality management integrated system connects the quality information flow of the whole value chain, including market, R&D, supply chain, and manufacturing, to achieve synchronized response to quality problems and traceability of the whole product life cycle.

Photo credit: BAIC Trucks

The first vehicle that rolled off the production line at the DT@iFactory, the i-Beijing, has completed over 10 million kilometers of actual road validation and 130 million kilometers of digital virtual validation. The i-Beijing pioneered a user-ordering system to realize over 20,000 product configuration combinations to meet users' personalization needs, making each vehicle a private custom. 

Up to now, the first batch of pre-sale orders for the i-Beijing trucks has reached 503 units, more than 600 service stations have been trained, and more than 10 million yuan of spare parts have been put on the market, said BAIC Trucks.