Standardizing and Accelerating Technology
Noting that the concept emerged fairly recently, Szypulski pointed to initial recognition of the need to establish an industry consortium to help define and refine the new digital transformation concept. That consortium was created as part of the Object Management Group, a worldwide-recognized body responsible for a large number of software and system standards.
"Not everyone understood the concept at first," she said. "Clearly it was new, and some people were just throwing words out there without agreement on terms and definitions. So, the consortium took shape in early 2020 to start standardizing that terminology. And we are one of the founding members."
She added that the whole point of the consortium is to share ideas around digital twins, across all industries. This will help to accelerate the technology's development. For example, if we can create more standards for digital twins, it will be easier to use tools created with it across different platforms—regardless of what company developed them. This should help to speed up the process of bringing digital twins into wider use and expanding its potential applications.
"The commercial world has been leading on this until now," Szypulski added, "and we want to use the consortium to accelerate this digital transformation as quickly as possible for the aerospace and defense industry.”
As the full potential of the digital twin is realized, Szypulski would like to see a renewed conversation about what problems the technology can solve for the Department of Defense.
"Actually, that's another reason that we really want to be part of the consortium: to better educate people on what digital twin really means and what it can contribute to program success," she said.
