System Lifecycle Handler — Spinning a Digital Thread for Manufacturing

TLDR

The digital thread aims to streamline manufacturing by linking design, production, and support, potentially cutting cycle time by 75% and saving $30 billion annually, and NIST’s Digital Thread for Smart Manufacturing project is developing the necessary methods and protocols. This paper presents a proof‑of‑concept System Lifecycle Handler (SLH) software environment for the digital thread initiative. The SLH provides services to build, manage, query, and visualize the digital thread by linking heterogeneous artifacts—from requirements and system architecture to PLM/CAD/CAM and simulation models, to machines and sensor data streams—using the Syndeia platform and exposing its capabilities through a web dashboard and standard REST/HTTP API.

Abstract

Abstract Transforming the manufacturing economy from paper‐based information flows to a seamless digital thread across geographically distributed supply chains has the potential to reduce cycle time by 75% and save manufacturers $30 billion annually. The “Digital Thread for Smart Manufacturing” project at NIST 1 is developing methods and protocols for completing a digital thread running through design, manufacturing, and product support processes. In this paper, we present a proof‐of‐concept System Lifecycle Handler (SLH) software environment being developed for the digital thread initiative. The SLH provides services to build, manage, query, and visualize the digital thread by connecting heterogeneous artifacts ranging from requirements and system architecture to PLM/CAD/CAM and simulation models to machines and sensor data streams. The SLH software environment leverages the Syndeia platform, and exposes its capabilities via a web dashboard and standard REST/HTTP API.