Top Industrial IoT Solutions Solving Big Challenges for Manufacturers, Utilities, and Building Operators
Investments in Internet of Things (IoT) projects are set to increase this year, with a significant portion of that spending focused on the manufacturing industry. Research firm IDC predicts that companies in the manufacturing sector will outspend other industries, with a total expenditure of $805.7 billion by 2023, representing a 10.6 percent increase from the previous year.
To address the growing need for industrial IoT solutions in manufacturing operations and production asset management, CRN has compiled a list of top vendors that are solving major challenges for manufacturers, utilities, and building operators. These vendors include Hitachi Vantara, Johnson Controls, Litmus, PTC, and Siemens.
Hitachi Vantara is offering utilities a new way to protect power grids from climate-related challenges. Through their Lumada Inspection Insights portfolio, Hitachi provides applications that leverage artificial intelligence to analyze photographs, videos, and satellite imagery. These applications enable utilities to automate asset inspection, improve sustainability, enhance physical security, and reduce risks and impacts related to storms or fires.
Johnson Controls is helping organizations reduce the carbon footprint of their buildings through their OpenBlue Enterprise Manager platform. The platform offers a suite of apps to monitor and improve energy efficiency. It allows organizations to track, manage, and analyze energy use while calculating greenhouse gas emissions. Organizations can set emissions reduction goals and receive recommendations on achieving these goals at the building level.
Litmus is enabling manufacturers to enhance their operations by quickly connecting industrial assets and collecting machine data for analysis and integration with other systems. Their Litmus Edge platform provides over 275 pre-built industrial drivers that can connect to a wide range of assets. This data is then collected, normalized, and contextualized for real-time analytics, integration with other applications, and running machine learning models to optimize operations.
PTC’s ThingWorx platform empowers industrial companies to increase productivity, lower costs, improve quality, and maximize revenue. It offers comprehensive capabilities to connect industrial devices, build applications, analyze data, control systems, and provide field staff with safer and more effective ways to engage with physical objects and systems. The platform includes digital performance management, which identifies bottlenecks, critical issues, and areas for improvement within a company’s operations.
Siemens is developing solutions that utilize data from industrial assets to improve processes and reduce costs for manufacturers. Their Insights Hub platform enables real-time monitoring of asset or factory line performance, benchmarking equipment effectiveness, predicting quality through machine learning models, and minimizing downtime related to materials. Furthermore, Siemens allows organizations to build digital twin simulations of factory floors using IoT data, allowing them to experiment with process changes in software to optimize operations.
These industrial IoT solutions address significant challenges faced by manufacturers, utilities, and building operators. By leveraging the power of IoT technology, these vendors empower organizations to enhance their operations, reduce costs, improve efficiency, and make data-driven decisions. As businesses worldwide ramp up their investments in IoT projects, these solutions are poised to play a crucial role in shaping the future of manufacturing and industrial operations.