Digital shipyard simulates vessels of tomorrow

Edited by the Engineeringtalk editorial team May 23, 2006

The world's leading shipbuilder Samsung Heavy Industries has built a simulation-based digital shipyard using Delmia digital manufacturing technology.

The world's leading shipbuilder Samsung Heavy Industries (SHI) has built a simulation-based digital shipyard using Delmia digital manufacturing technology, enabling the company to successfully establish a real-time supply chain network for collaborative production.

With Delmia, SHI's Korea-based Geoje Shipyard is able to simulate design and engineering processes and digitally manage its facilities, procedures, and engineering schedules by shipbuilding in a virtual environment.

"In the future, simulation-based manufacturing (SBM) will play a pivotal role in strengthening the competitiveness of manufacturing by applying IT technologies", noted Hwang Gyu-Ok, General Manager of the Information System Group for SHI.

"The digital shipyard is not a simple operational system, but rather a key infrastructure, so it is critical that we use the best technology in simulation-based manufacturing".

"SHI has successfully implemented a new conceptual digital shipyard solution simulating the whole process, ranging from conceptual design through operation to maintenance", added Bertrand Saint-Martin, Vice-President, Delmia Asia-Pacific Operations.

"Dassault Systemes is proud to have partnered with SHI to facilitate this innovation".

In order to increase its competitiveness, SHI joined the Korean Government-led project for building a simulation-based digital shipyard, managed by the Ministry of Information and Communication and the Ministry of Commerce, Energy and Industry.

Delmia digital manufacturing solutions were implemented for the core virtual shipbuilding technology, in collaboration with experts from six universities including the Ocean Engineering Department of Seoul National University and the Korea Marine Ocean Research Development Institute.

In the first phase of its project to design an integrated simulator for processes from loading to manufacturing the hull, SHI adopted the Delmia solutions Igrip, VNC, Quest and Delfoi Integrator to verify the digital modelling and manufacturing design.

The simulation enabled analyses of the operation rate by equipment and period, which in turn led to enhanced customer satisfaction and technological competitiveness, reducing the time required to analyse operations from over 30 minutes to five.

The simulation-based manufacturing management is expected to reduce cost by $7.3 million a year.

In addition, thanks to the possibility of verifying shipbuilding processes virtually using Delmia Digital Shipbuilding Solution (DSS), SHI was granted the gold award for the Pacific Rim in the World's Business Process Management Conference at the end of last year, and the Business Process award for leading technology by Samsung IT Symposium, a knowledge management award within the Samsung Group.

The digital shipyard is currently being operated in the third dock at Geoje shipyard.

SHI's new factory and the DSS are scheduled to be extended to the first and second docks.

Additional implementations are being discussed.