Difac Framework: the landscape of a project beyond the EU

In this paper, an international IMS project for future digital factory is presented. Three regions, Korea, EU and Switzerland have participated in this project (DiFac: Digital Factory for Human-oriented Production) with respective but complementary aims focused on: Human safety modelling, Collaborative VR based manufacturing environment, human-web based ERP system and interface. The project central architecture is introduced and afterwards, three regional project frameworks are separately described. Human factors are the core concerns for the three regional projects, which are to be integrated based on the DiFac Hub for standardised data exchange and information sharing. As a result of this multi-disciplinary and across-cultural project, a series of integrated tools and/or components will be developed to support human-oriented digital factory design / evaluation, collaborative product development and production / training activities with particular concerns on human-safety and workplace ergonomics.