The concepts of smart factories in industry are becoming increasingly important and necessary to remain competitive in global markets. Due to the timeliness, importance and especially the many ambiguities in the concepts, approaches and solutions in the field of smart factories, research in this area is necessary and has increased in number in recent years, both globally and in Slovenia. A large number of research papers prove that this area is not yet sufficiently researched. New methods for designing smart factories are being developed, including reference architecture models and approaches for defining the necessary parameters for the development of the digital twin, which make planning easier, clearer and faster. Most existing methods and architecture models are very abstract and therefore less suitable for industrial use. Based on the presented problem, we decided to develop a methodology for the design of a smart factory, which includes three steps: (i) workshops in the company that wants to introduce the smart factory concept, (ii) two-dimensional reference architecture model, and (iii) universal approach to determine the parameters for the development of digital twins, regardless of the size and type of production. The aim of the methodology is to present the process of planning a smart factory step by step, from the initial idea of a smart factory to its final realization in a real environment. In the dissertation, we used a case study to present the deployment and planning process of a smart factory according to the presented methodology. We focused mainly on the development and deployment of the architectural model and on the definition of the data needed for the development of digital twins. For the last step, we presented the whole design process for digital twins with several sub-steps, from the definition of the manufacturing system to the final use of the digital twins.
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