Update

nebumind featured in staff magazine of Airbus

13/04/2021

The following text is a copy of the Airbus staff magazine article (April 2021)

No poking in the data fog

The start-up nebumind is a good example of how Airbus activities at the Ottobrunn/Taufkirchen site also generate such new economic ideas that can result in the founding of a new company.

Since 2019, there has been nebumind, whose unusual name certainly refers to the nebulous and hidden. In this case, however, it is not about fabled dark places, but about the collection and organization of large amounts of data that are generated during a production process. Particularly in the aerospace sector, the production of components for aircraft or rockets is usually small batch production, if not elaborate manual work. The result is expensive and becomes even more expensive if it cannot be used due to quality defects. Identifying and preventing the occurrence of these defects in the manufacturing process is the main benefit of the nebumind software.

To this end, nebumind has developed a novel concept of data structuring in which data from machines and sensors are assigned to each individual component and processed as a digital component twin. In this way, it is then possible to identify relatively quickly not only the defect location but also the production step responsible for it. This also makes it possible to detect already during the manufacturing process, on the basis of changing measurement data and machine parameters (temperature, pressure, etc.), that the product will not meet the required quality standards. It’s good if a manufacturing process can be stopped on this basis and not incur even more costs for a defective component.

As a Quality 4.0 solution, nebumind founder and CEO Caroline Albert describes the core product of her start-up: „High quality is not only crucial for a good cost structure in manufacturing, but quite elementary for the success of any company.“ Together with their five nebumind comrades-in-arms, however, they also learn from mistakes in the production process and want to use this knowledge to exert a targeted influence on design and development. „Potential sources of error should not even enter the component development process,“ she emphasizes. Together with aerospace customers, they are working to expand the approach to drastically reduce component qualification or delta qualification. In doing so, they are enabling their customers to make adjustments in production more agilely in the future.

Composite manufacturing, 3D printing or high-precision milling are production processes that are also used at the Airbus site in Ottobrunn, whether at Innovation X, the Airbus research division, the 3D printing specialist AP Works or the engine builders of ArianeGroup. Analytical procedures for quality assurance for these technologies are complex and cost-intensive. This is nebumind’s field of activity. The next step for the young company is to find suitable investors so that it can grow faster and also enter a new dimension with the nebumind software, which is issued via licenses. The proximity to Airbus Defence and Space, the Technical University of Munich, the University of the German Armed Forces and other start-up companies at the Ottobrunn/Taufkirchen location are a good breeding ground for this.

Photo: The two founders of nebumind: Caroline Albert (right) and Franz Engel.