IT in Manufacturing


Simplifying AI training

May 2024 IT in Manufacturing

The TwinCAT Machine Learning Creator from Beckhoff is aimed at automation and process experts, and adds the automated creation of AI models to the TwinCAT 3 workflow. This allows users to handle the entire process, from data collection to the trained model, for themselves – without any AI expertise of their own. The finished model is optimally adapted to real-time requirements in the control environment in terms of latency and accuracy.

A prime application for the versatile TwinCAT Machine Learning Creator (TE3850) lies in AI-supported image processing for quality assurance. This, along with various other applications, taps into the ease and standardisation of creating AI models for automation through Beckhoff’s no-code development platform. It not only leverages open standards, interfaces, and best practices, but also provides the trained models in the open standard format ONNX. These latency-optimised AI models for control applications are specially adapted to run on Beckhoff IPCs and with TwinCAT products, although they can also be used as ONNX models beyond the Beckhoff product world.

With TwinCAT Machine Learning Creator offering fully automated AI model creation, the potential of artificial intelligence is now available to all – including smaller companies – offering a competitive edge and much-needed solutions for the growing shortage of specialist skills. And for seasoned AI experts, this solution serves to streamline their workload considerably, while also minimising the potential for errors. The ability to speed up project development processes offers yet another clear advantage, particularly as the development tool provides extensive and transparent methods for displaying the behaviour of the models created and comparing them with each other. Users can also benefit from automated report generation, which supports auditing processes for AI model creation. Another crucial aspect is that the required application-specific data remains protected since it does not leave the company.


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