Digital transformation is a crucial engine for high-quality development in enterprises and a powerful tool for building an innovation-driven development pattern. In recent years, the 509 Institute has adhered to the principles of “Benchmarking against the advanced, business-driven, balancing construction and use, and supported by information technology”. It has introduced advanced concepts and cutting-edge technologies such as MBSE, big data, and collaborative office systems, systematically constructing a digital work environment that is cloud-based, virtualized, and collaboratively parallel. This has gradually formed a digital work model characterized by “collaboration, openness, and sharing,” accelerating the development of digital transformation and creating a new engine for high-quality development in the satellite field.
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From MBD to MBSE
Continuously Promoting Model Digital Transformation
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After nearly a decade of continuous efforts, through Model-Based Definition (MBD), the 509 Institute has achieved cross-regional, multi-disciplinary, and comprehensive collaborative parallel design for single machine design front-end, overall internal, and manufacturing back-end. In 2018, the 509 Institute began planning and leading the development of a satellite full-process information management system and pilot applications, focusing on the structured control of manufacturing quality characteristic data during the overall satellite AIT process, driving the design-transfer-collection-application closed loop of AIT assembly information, laying a solid foundation for the digital transformation of satellites.
The 509 Institute not only meticulously advances the digitalization of the satellite development process but also continuously explores system planning and verification based on digital technology. It plans to establish an MBSE association to gather talent and track the latest developments domestically and internationally, organize learning to introduce concepts, and expand thinking. With the construction idea of “platform + APP,” it has introduced an MBSE collaborative work platform, organized efforts to carry out pilot verification, taking a crucial step towards building a new generation of MBSE-based forward R&D system, significantly increasing the coordination and compatibility of various systems, and promoting the digital transformation of model development towards the depth of system effectiveness contribution project verification. The verification and development based on digital models will promote the practical application of model-based operation and maintenance, ultimately achieving a full-cycle digital closed loop of verification, development, and operation and maintenance, supporting future leapfrog development.
Currently, MBSE has been applied in multiple simulation application system projects and has gradually been promoted to several model bidding and digital satellite development, achieving significant engineering benefits, enhancing the influence of the 509 Institute among users. Among them, the Fengyun-4 microwave satellite, as a pilot project for MBSE, received special funding support from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, thus promoting the transformation and upgrading of the 509 Institute’s system design capabilities.
In the future, focusing on model bidding and digital satellite development tasks and their application research, the 509 Institute will adhere to innovative ideas, explore new paths, and continuously develop modeling and simulation technologies represented by MBSE, guiding the construction of a new generation of MBSE-based forward design system, and continuously promoting the digital transformation of model development, creating a new engine for development in the satellite field.
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Creating Excellence through the Integration of Five Innovations in Satellite Electrical Testing
Achieving Precise Measurement and Judgment through a Unified Network
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Design is the source of quality, and quality is the guarantee of success. The 8th Academy’s 14th Five-Year Plan clearly proposes to vigorously cultivate the “Aerospace + Information Technology +” industry, comprehensively promoting digital transformation, and achieving “one network for all services” and “one network for all management” in model development.
The 509 Institute undertakes advanced testing technology research tasks in the satellite field of the 8th Academy, while also bearing the important responsibility of digitalizing satellite testing, creating a standardized, information-based, automated, expert-driven, and intelligent “five-in-one” health evaluation system for satellites, achieving “efficient testing, comprehensive testing, and intelligent testing” for satellites, and striving to achieve full-process digitalization of testing on-site through information technology.
Focusing on the digital transformation of testing, the 509 Institute has built a testing service application “one network,” achieving software automatic deployment, centralized virus scanning, comprehensive equipment monitoring, and remote expert assistance tasks “one network for all management”. At the same time, it has established a big data management operation platform, proposing an overall solution for satellite data “collection, storage, management, and utilization,” achieving “one network for all services” in testing design, testing implementation, data management, and data analysis, improving testing efficiency by 80%.
“Through the cloud-based testing data, we have opened up a new model for remote testing, achieving real-time handling of emergencies in different locations, daily remote technical support, and also achieving the fusion and sharing of testing data with on-orbit data throughout their life cycle, enhancing the utilization efficiency of testing data,” said Dong Fang, director of the testing room.
Through digitalization of testing design, testing specifications and test programs have achieved digital collaborative design, doubling the speed of fault diagnosis sequence generation, achieving full traceability of panoramic data, and 100% automation of all business testing; increasing more than 10 types of big data fault detection methods, integrating more than 50 associated rule interpretation model scripts into the satellite testing interpretation system, fully utilizing software-based expert knowledge, significantly improving the quality and efficiency of testing interpretation.
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Innovating Server Virtualization
First Official Application in the 8th Academy
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To accelerate digital development in the satellite field, the 509 Institute is actively promoting the incubation and implementation of new technologies such as server virtualization and collaborative office systems. Under the guidance of a unified security policy system, the 509 Institute has adopted virtualization technology to reconstruct the network architecture of core servers, deploying a server virtualization cluster in the information system, virtualizing 37 out of 55 physical servers, becoming one of the first units in the 8th Academy to apply server virtualization.
“Server virtualization consolidates the low-utilization server loads into one server, with various application systems managed uniformly, reducing management difficulty and labor costs, and achieving flexible data applications. CPU utilization has increased from the original 10% to 70%, greatly enhancing the resource utilization of the institute’s servers,” said Wang Zhengfeng, deputy director of the information technology department.
Based on current mainstream cloud computing and virtualization technologies, the 509 Institute has built a collaborative office system environment with 160 workstations, used for model scheme verification, collaborative design in model development, and paperless training, meeting the urgent needs of explosive model development in the satellite field.
To do a good job, one must first sharpen their tools. Enhancing information technology capabilities and upgrading digital transformation is the only way to support deepening reforms and building a new development pattern. The global economy is undergoing unprecedented changes, and the 509 Institute continues to promote the innovative application of a new generation of information technology, actively pushing for a business-oriented, gradually iterative, and system-integrated digital development, accelerating the digital transformation of the entire satellite development process, empowering the aerospace industry to achieve “high quality, high efficiency, and high benefits” development.
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Authors: Yang Li, Yuan Jinru, Yao Jun
Editor: Ma Yongxiang
Chief Editor: Yue Fusheng
Supervisors: Liu Qian, Shen Rui