Competences of cyber physical systems engineers — Survey results

Cyber physical systems (CPS) consist of physical and cyber components seamlessly integrated with each other. Being a core and an essential component within the digitalization process, CPS are becoming pervasive in all spheres of modern society. Understanding CPS structures and associated functionalities requires a multidisciplinary body of knowledge and engineering capabilities. Moreover, they are laying on the edge of a broad spectrum of methodologies and technologies, from mechatronics, communication, control and automation to information technologies, which are penetrating each corner of the society. It is obvious from the lifecycle of CPS, i.e., life cycle of the physical-part and the digital thread of the cyber-part, that developers, operators and managers of CPS have to acquire an essential interdisciplinary engineering qualification and a combination of skills and competencies from many different disciplines, including social and psychological aspects, among others. In order to develop and implement an adequate educational programme, two major aspects have been analysed in this paper: (i) identification and understanding of the minimal set of multidisciplinary competencies and qualifications needed and (ii) identification and classification of the critical gaps in the existing engineering curricula. The analysis is based on the findings of a survey conducted in two IEEE conferences closely related to the engineering disciplines associated with CPS.