The Virtual Manufacturing concept: Scope, Socio-Economic Aspects and Future Trends

The research area " Virtual Manufacturing (VM) " is the use of information technology and computer simulation to model real world manufacturing processes for the purpose of analysing and understanding them. As automation technologies such as CAD/CAM have substantially shortened the time required to design products, Virtual Manufacturing will have a similar effect on the manufacturing phase thanks to the modelling, simulation and optimisation of the product and the processes involved in its fabrication. After a description of Virtual Manufacturing (definitions and scope), we present some socioeconomic factors of VM and finaly some " hot topics " for the future are proposed. INTRODUCTION Manufacturing is an indispensable part of the economy and is the central activity that encompasses product, process, resources and plant. Nowadays products are more and more complex, processes are highly-sophisticated and use micro-technology and mechatronic, the market demand (lot sizes) evolves rapidly so that we need a flexible and agile production. Moreover manufacturing enterprises may be widely distributed geographically and linked conceptually in terms of dependencies and material, information and knowledge flows. In this complex and evolutive environment, industrialists must know about