The Challenge
A major US automotive manufacturer is planning a significant new facility, encompassing body in white, paint, and general assembly, trim and final. Ahead of that build, the business needed to establish a clear, tested, and documented set of standards for robot simulation and virtual commissioning, to ensure consistency across all suppliers involved in delivering the new facility.
Without agreed standards in place, different suppliers will approach virtual commissioning in different ways, using different tools, different levels of model fidelity, and different testing criteria. The result is inconsistency, rework, and integration risk when the physical build begins. The manufacturer wanted to get ahead of this problem, defining what good virtual commissioning looks like for their programmes so that every supplier working on the new facility would be working to the same specification from day one.
The brief: Work closely with the manufacturer's engineering team to develop, test and document new robot simulation and virtual commissioning standards. Prove the standards through an initial test case — a single PLC with 14 FANUC robots — and validate them against an intensive testing process ahead of broader adoption by all suppliers.
What Duke Did
Collaborative Standards Development
Duke Control Systems is working directly alongside the manufacturer's own engineering team, not as a remote supplier but as an integrated part of the standards development process. This close collaboration ensures that the standards being developed reflect both Duke's deep experience in virtual commissioning delivery and the manufacturer's specific operational requirements, programme structure, and supplier base.
The work involves defining what is required at each stage of the virtual commissioning process — from model fidelity and tool selection through to the testing criteria that a simulation must pass before it can be considered ready for physical implementation on site.
Multi-Platform Simulation
The standards development work spans three simulation platforms: Siemens Process Simulate for the overall virtual commissioning environment, FANUC Roboguide for offline robot programming and path validation, and FE Screen Sim for operator interface simulation. Defining standards across multiple platforms requires a clear understanding of how each tool is used, where they interact, and how outputs from one feed into another — exactly the kind of cross-platform expertise Duke brings to this programme.
The Test Case: 1 PLC, 14 FANUC Robots
To prove the standards in practice before they are rolled out to the wider supplier base, Duke is delivering a test case using a single PLC controlling 14 FANUC robots. This test case is being developed, simulated, and validated entirely in accordance with the emerging standards, with the objective of demonstrating that the standards work in practice and that a virtual commissioning programme delivered to them will meet the manufacturer's requirements when it reaches the physical build phase.
The test case is subject to an intensive testing process, deliberately designed to stress the standards and surface any gaps or ambiguities before they become issues on a real programme. This approach — prove it hard in the test, make it easier in production — is exactly how robust standards should be developed.
Documentation for Supplier Adoption
Alongside the technical development work, Duke is producing the documentation that will allow the standards to be adopted by all suppliers involved in the manufacturer's future programmes. Clear, unambiguous documentation is what makes the difference between standards that are genuinely followed and standards that exist only on paper — and getting this right is as important as the technical content itself.
Standards only work if everyone actually follows them. That means they have to be clear, testable, and realistic about what the tools can deliver. Getting that balance right is the hard part, and it is why this kind of work needs people who have actually done virtual commissioning on live programmes, not just written about it.
Planning a major programme and need the standards right first time?
Getting your virtual commissioning approach right before the first supplier is appointed is one of the highest-value things you can do. Get in touch to talk through what that looks like.
Start a Conversation →Current Status
This programme is in progress. Duke's engineers continue to work with the manufacturer's team on the development and testing of the virtual commissioning standards, with the test case PLC and 14-robot cell being progressed on a tight timeline ahead of the broader supplier adoption phase.
At a Glance
- Sector: Automotive, USA
- Scope: Virtual commissioning standards development, multi-platform simulation, test case delivery, documentation
- Platforms: Siemens Process Simulate, FANUC Roboguide, FE Screen Sim
- Test Case: 1 PLC, 14 FANUC robots
- Output: Standards to be adopted by all suppliers on future programmes
- Timeline: Tight, deadline-driven
- Status: In progress