Your consultative SMART facilitator: IIoT under one roof
08 November 2017
Routeco can provide expertise as a consultative SMART facilitator, to help you achieve the visionary improvements in the business performance you are striving for. Answer some simple questions in this article and see how SMART you really are.
What is Routeco’s vision for the future of Industrial Automation and IoT?
With the growing momentum of what we know as IT/OT convergence, Industry 4.0 (Fourth Revolution) and Connected Enterprise, working out what being SMART really means for your business can be a challenge. One of the key challenges being how to gain visibility and transparency across your total business. When full visibility is achieved then improved processes, assets, locations, real-time accurate data, sustainable improvements in productivity and profitability become automatic and inevitable.
The danger in this goal is that the desire to get quick data very often means that not enough commitment is given to building a solid and robust network infrastructure; the consequences of which can be seen across many businesses today. To have real-time accurate data, businesses need to invest time, money and effort into their industrial network infrastructure including the convergence of IT/OT.
Routeco can provide expertise as a consultative SMART facilitator to our customers; to help you achieve the visionary improvements in the business performance you are striving for.
The process is not simple, but committing professionally to implementing it correctly will return the level of dividends that progressive businesses are looking for; our knowledge allows us to highlight products, services and partnerships that enable us to deliver your SMART vision in a totally scalable and bespoke way.
Routeco are also proud to be recently appointed as Cisco’s first Advanced Internet of Things Industry Expert Specialised Partner in the UK. The Cisco IoT Industry Expert Specialisation enable partners to combine their Operations Technology (OT) experience with Cisco IT networking knowledge. IoT Industry Expert Specialised Partners have experience working in industries such as manufacturing, energy and utilities, travel and transport, and/or connected safety and security. They have an understanding of Cisco products and concepts to be able to provide their customers the IoT solution they need.
What is IIoT and what does it look like?
The IT/OT space is extremely dynamic, impacting on many different areas within our customers’ businesses. Recently, IIoT has started paving its way into the manufacturing industry, with the increase in devices, equipment and machinery available for connection to the network. Many companies are taking risks with existing poorly designed infrastructure, some are still sceptical about the rewards that IIoT brings and some are vaguely aware of what it even means.
So, what does it mean?
In simple terms, it is the digitisation of technology and offering transparency of data across the business in real time. Here at Routeco, we know that people are still trying to understand what IT/OT and IIoT means for their business.
Our customers operate in a wide range of industries and approach Industrial Networks from differing perspectives. There is a growing interest emerging in engineering; the need to learn and explore network solutions and services is becoming more prominent.
More manufacturers are now providing solutions that rely on having sound and secure networks available within a typical manufacturing factory 24/7. This is driving the need for engineers to up-skill in order to maintain and service plants with minimal down time.
The convergence of IT and OT within our customers also present us with cultural differences that exist between engineering and IT and this has led us to follow a more consultative path involving both. We have been working more closely with our franchise partners and IT VARs to broaden and understand their insight of the industrial automation space.
What does this mean in an industrial automation environment?
We can look at this in three key areas:
1. Presentation and storage of data – Information Technology
2. Network infrastructure - common platform allows for convergence
3. Real time production data – Operational Technology
Largely, IT is known as the centre of data analysis and OT as the shop floor or where all the activity happens in terms of production. This means multiple systems, managing high risk areas and no coalition of what happens in IT or OT. Now with convergence, the two can be seen working hand in hand to drive results and efficiencies for businesses.
Your network infrastructure is the critical middle ground and here data must transfer securely and reliably. Operational Technology is the source of fundamental data from the production area or manufacturing process, which is not necessarily being harvested to make critical business decisions.
What production issues and business challenges are you currently facing?
In a world that is digital more than ever today and reliant on technology, we know from experience the issues businesses are facing now, especially when it comes to IIoT and IT/OT convergence. In the case of IT/OT, the two have historically had separate business objectives, though now with IT Managers starting to converse more freely with the production staff and engineers, the business can be seen from a much larger scale and the intricacies of issues and flow are more visible.
Here at Routeco, we have the expertise to help you think about where your business currently is and to get you thinking about your SMART objectives for the future.
Below are a few areas for you to think about: Is your business:
• Suffering network issues?
• Secure from cyber-attacks?
• Thinking about optimising profitability?
• Perceiving your issues as software/hardware issues but it’s your failing infrastructure?
• Have you thought about network failure and the impact that could have on production (think about real-time down time and financial loss)?
How SMART are you?
A good starting point is to understand where you are today. Which of the factories above best describe your current situation?
If Factory C was your answer then great, you’re already a market leader, with profitable growth and expansion. If Factory A or B was your answer then it’s time to start thinking about becoming SMARTer.
Routeco’s recommended next steps to becoming SMART and enabling the IIoT in your business will be the focus point in the second part of this article. Look out for it in the next issue of Connectivity.
Routeco IIoT seminars, Wales and Scotland, November
We want to invite you for our first IIoT (Industrial Internet of Things) seminars with key franchise partners to help you understand what IoT means, attend sessions to learn more about our partners' products and have the opportunity to ask questions to understand the benefits of IoT to your company.
Joining us on the day are: Cisco, Panduit, Rockwell Automation and Stratus Technology.
Dates and Locations:
• Celtic Manor Resort, Wales, Tuesday 21st November, 1000 - 1500 with lunch and refreshments.
• Dakota at Eurocentral Glasgow, Tuesday 28th November, 1000 - 1500 with lunch and refreshments.
To attend either of these events and for more information, please email: techworkshop@routeco.com
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