The Industrial IoT: Capturing the Potential

The Internet of Things promises to change the way the world works and it may very well do so first on the shop floor. While intelligent homes, smart cars, and networked traffic infrastructure is still a pipe dream for most, the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) has the potential to be implemented in today’s factories and supply chains for immediate benefits to early adopters.

The industrial revolution changed how we made things, the digital revolution gave us business productivity through computers and software and the internet revolution connected more people to information. Today the internet of things (IoT) revolution is underway, bringing together people, data and machines to increase efficiencies and improve quality of lives in ways we never imagined. Disruptive technologies are becoming more common, pressures are bigger and, yes, new opportunities are greater as well. Technologies such as IoT, robotics, artificial intelligence, big data analytics and AI are driving tremendous market opportunities.

The Internet of Things promises to change the way the world works and it may very well do so first on the shop floor. While intelligent homes, smart cars, and networked traffic infrastructure is still a pipe dream for most, the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) has the potential to be implemented in today’s factories and supply chains for immediate benefits to early adopters.

“Now, the Fourth Industrial Revolution as exemplified by IIoT is expanding across the globe. IIoT is about machines, systems, and products communicating with each other. It’s about creating smart factories that will increase manufacturing flexibility, speed, and accuracy. These smart factories will track metrics such as machine utilization in order to optimize production.”

IIoT is poised to transform many industry verticals including healthcare, retail, automotive, and transport. Initially focusing on improving existing processes and augmented current infrastructure, IIoT will evolve to encompass next generation methods and procedures such as “teleoperation” (operation of a machine at a distance), tele-robotics, and other areas that rely upon interface and control of real objects by virtual objects.

Gaining Hold in 2017

In the broadest sense, the IIoT enables you to have your entire manufacturing, processing, handling, and shipping lines be fully instrumented and controlled via network-based operations. This connection is not just limited to specific factories, either-it can link together your entire company as well as all of your suppliers, making your entire industrial activity “food chain” one connected operation.

The benefits of incorporating IIoT into your company’s operations are numerous, but the top three benefits of IIoT implementation are:

• More Effective Predictive Maintenance 

At present, most manufacturing companies have a reactionary approach to equipment failure: when something breaks, they go out and fix it. But adding IIoT to your operations streamlines maintenance by using sensors and software to predict when equipment will fail and fix small problems before they become large and costly. This can save you up to 30% in industrial maintenance costs and reduce your production downtime by up to 70%.

• Equipment Tracking and Analyzing Innovation 

IIoT sensors can also be used for real-time data tracking. For example, Michelin sells tires with embedded sensors that track fuel consumption, tire pressure, temperature, speed, and location of fleet trucks. The data is then sent back to the company and analyzed so that fuel saving recommendations can be made to fleet managers. This level of real-time data analysis leads to extensive savings and time management.

• Increased Revenues 

The innovative efficiencies IIoT can bring to your business not only save you time by streamlining operations, but can also drastically increase revenues. GE alone has utilized their own IIoT software to the tune of $5 billion in revenues, and while that is an exceptional example that many companies won’t match, it does illustrate the money making potential of IIoT.

The time to invest in connecting your manufacturing company to the IIoT is now. Recent studies have shown that more than 80% of large successful companies in the U.S. Believe that the IIoT will be essential to their future success, and the industry agrees. Research conducted by Industry ARC projects that the value of the IIoT market will continue to exponentially grown from 2017 until 2020, where it is expected to reach an estimated value of $120 billion.

Global IIoT Market

It might not seem that the Internet of Things, or industrial IoT will be a significant revenue driver in much of Asia, aside from Northeast Asia, by about 2020. That might not be the case. India, for example, should be among the more important growth markets for IIoT.

That has clear implications for mobile service providers, as accounts driven by enterprise customers should become more important.

The global industrial internet of things (IIoT) market is set to grow faster than seven percent, on a compound annual growth rate basis, to 2020, according to Technavio.

Asia Pacific (Asia) will be the biggest market for IIoT, according to Technavio. The IIoT market in Asia was valued at close to US$38 billion in 2015 and is expected to reach over US$54 billion in 2020. Though most would expect China, Korea and Japan to be leading growth markets, India also is predicted to be a driver of much growth.  The global IIoT market will drive US$132 billion in revenue by 2020.

What are the Challenges?

By making machines smarter through local processing and communication, the IIoT could solve problems in ways that were previously inconceivable. But, as the saying goes, “If it was easy, everyone would be doing it.” As innovation grows so does the complexity, which makes the IIoT a very large challenge that no company alone can meet.

This challenge becomes even more daunting and complex when comparing the requirements of the industrial internet to those of the consumer internet. Both involve connecting devices and systems all across the globe, but the IIoT adds stricter requirements to its local networks for latency, determinism, and bandwidth. When dealing with precision machines that can fail if timing is off by a millisecond, adhering to strict requirements becomes pivotal to the health and safety of the machine operators, the machines, and the business.

Given that IIoT has potential to make manufacturing more beneficial, it is sure that investing time and resources on implementing are more than worth the money. However, there are some big challenges that industry will have to deal with before the benefits of IIoT can be maximized.

Interoperability

Concept of IIoT (or even IoT, in this case) is fairly new and making sure that different IIoT devices will work together is still a fairly complicated task. To achieve full interoperability, the industry will have to build and implement standard protocols, compatible interfaces and architectures.

Security

No matter what device it is, if it is connected on internet, there is always a risk that it can be Hacked. Having a bullet-proof security is a big challenge for IIoT. As IIoT devices will always be connected to network, the network setup and IoT software has to be secure enough so that no vulnerability can be exposed.

Optimizing power efficiency

Generally, IoT devices don’t need that much power and in the case of Home IoT, the power-consumption is not a big concern. However, in case of IIoT, the picture is a bit different. Within some years, there will be potentially billions of IIoT devices installed and working in different industries, these will require a lot of power. Making sure that devices are as much as power efficient as possible will be an important task.

Finding common development environment

The software development process is different for IoT than traditional computers. Normally, developers who produce software for embedded devices work with C while most developers who work with cloud technologies work in Java, Ruby, Python and other languages. For quality software production for IIoT devices, it has become necessary for the industry to find out and implement common development environments.

Future of IIoT

IIC (or Industrial Internet Consortium) is working for architectural framework of Industrial IoT and we can expect that Industry 4.0 will keep increasing pace in its implementations, adoption and improvements.

We should soon see IoT machines who not only have Ethernet connectivity, but also support 3G and LTE Modules. Apart from that, we will also be seeing new IoT protocols as well as improved classic ones which will result in faster, easier data transfers between more compatible devices.

Mr. Abhed Misra, System Applications Lead, LPRF Solutions, Texas Instruments India Pvt. Ltd.

IOT is no more Internet of things it has become Internet of Everything. Once of the biggest, fastest and finest way of using IOT is evident in Industrial Sector. Whether it is sensors, access control, security, surveillance& monitoring or HMI, motor control or programmable logic control, everything is connected.

Within industrial IOT also manufacturing sector happens to be the biggest consumer of IOT solutions. IOT gets integrated from the very first stage of raw material loading and supply through tank level check indicators, loading trays occupancy adequate temperature sensing etc. Going forward the connected sensors, motor control and HMI ensure the flow, speed and service stages and then finally segregated and aligned output arrangements for manual inspection followed by packing.

Every stage is linked and connected to ensure most reliable, flawless and efficient system for best productivity and efficiency. The benefits of Industrial IOT are being cashed every single day by industries leading to big economic gains at all the economic levels.

Texas Instruments is a leader in IOT and is completely and comprehensively committed to address all the IOT flavors like industrial IOT, home automation, building automation and automotive IOT.

The amount of traction which has been there on the extensive connectivity and automation portfolio fromTI, has always motivated TI to keep investing and innovating new technologies in this field.

The path breaking Simplelink low power wireless SOC portfolios like CC26xx/CC13xx and Simplelinkwi-fi SOC like CC32xx, have raised the solution integration level and cost to quality ratio, to altogether new heights.

TI has dedicated processors for HMI and PLC solutions with reference solutions and production ready solutions from third party design partners.

With Instaspin available for motor control the solution development and deployment is only a matter of few days, as the user friendly GUI enables the solution architect to spin any motor in seconds.

TI also has a huge portfolio of IEC qualified captouch controllers(which can sense metal touch too) and catalog ARM controllers with integrated flash and analog peripherals, which can be used easily with the help of their individual part’s reference designs and extensive design library of TI designs specifically made for sub-systems of Industrial IOT.

Conclusively, TI fuels theSmart Manufacturing by specifically addressing all the essential aspects of manufacturing industry whether it is Flow optimization, Real-time inventory, Asset tracking, Employee safety, Predictive maintenance or Firmware updates.

TI has always kept the faith of its industrial customers built in past decades and is dedicatedly committed with its designs and products to make the Industrial IOT a successful revolution.

Mr. Sameer Gandhi, MD, Omron Automation, India

IIoT is the next generation of digital technology centered on smartly optimizing the industrial processes so as to enable the manufacturers to make the most of the industrial internet revolution.

The technology is an intricate and fascinating network of products, systems, platforms and applications communicating and sharing intelligence with each other & the manufacturing environment including the people. So it is basically not only making the machines intelligent but also making them communicate with each other and with their operators.  This, over a period of time, leads to superior levels of optimization further leading to real time waste management, economies of scale by bringing down the operating cost and, thus, production of better output which benefits not only the manufacturers but the end users too. At the core of the technology, currently, are varied smart sensors and PLCs that can connect to the MES/ERP layer facilitating access to real-time information exchange.

Here is a small example of understanding how IIoT could help predicting maintenance needs and prevent disruptions. Imagine an automotive assembly line, which would typically have a few thousand sensors. Now if any sensor from these fails, the entire line could stop working, which will require manual identification and repair/ replacement, leading to non-productive time. With IIoT, Omron is enabling to connect the sensor in a way, wherein we’re not only getting information from the sensor but also about the sensor. So we can now look into ambient conditions affecting the sensors and other deeper aspects, allowing us to predict the failure of a sensor, before it actually happens thus reducing disruptions due to unscheduled downtime.

Mr. Ravi Pagar, Regional Director for South Asia and Asean, element14

Industrial IoT alone is expected to have a market worth of 150 billion USD by 2020. Electronics industry supplying raw materials for this phenomenal development would grow on an equal rate. Connectivity and communication in any IoT device would require radio chips, micro controllers (MCU) and sensors. It is this demand that is going to drive the component manufacturing industries to reap huge gains from the market. IoT in the electronics industry would transform everyday objects by giving them life through sensors. According to a recent global survey commissioned by element14, worldwide interest on IoT is on an all-time high with 43% of the participants wanting to connect more devices and appliances to the internet. The most remarkable aspect of this study is the fact that this proportion rose to as high as 71% across China and India.

As the Development Distributor, we work with professional makers, start-ups and the largest electronics suppliers to research, design and develop new products with a key focus on IoT.   We sell the broadest range of development kits available, enabling users to express their creativity and expertise and bring their ideas to reality using kits from the popular Raspberry Pi and BeagleBone Black, to high utility models such as OM13086 LPC43S67 and A70CM Cloud Connectivity Kit, Freescale Freedom Development Platform for Kinetis K82, K81, and K80 MCUs and BC3770 Battery Charger Board with KL25Z.

Development kits such as the Raspberry Pi have been used to develop solutions around large scale automation in the industrial sector.  The Raspberry Pi has been used by a popular Out-of-Home entertainment industry to develop solutions which can enable the provider to push advertisements in high traffic zones and NEC Digital Displays is using a Compute Module 3, customised by element14, for their large-format displays, adding intelligence to what was a passive display.

To further support our customers, the element14 community provides working models of highly useful and efficient IoT devices developed with our design kits.  Through this community engineers can access peers and experts, research a new technology or design an electronic product.

Mr. Thilak Kumar, Field Application Engineering, Asia Pacific, Wind River

Industrial IoT, the latest wave of technological change, has reached an inflection point and is expected to transform companies and economies with unprecedented opportunities. It will leverage the all-pervasive internet to directly control the physical world that includes machines, factories and infrastructure, thus enabling a smart manufacturing landscape. This transformation will offer both short and long term opportunities. In short term, it will offer operational efficiency, productivity gains and better quality of product through predictive maintenance and remote management. This will also lead to improved uptime and better asset utilization. In long term, as the technology gains broader adoption, companies will be able to leverage the massive volumes of data from these assets, gain actionable insights from it, automate decisions and act in real time. With this, disruption will come from companies shifting from product centric business model to outcome based services, where customer will have the luxury of paying only for measurable results and not for the assets.

Wind River has been a leading provider of embedded solutions for the last 35 years. We have more than 2.5 billion devices in the field that runs our technology. This offers us the unique ability to connect these devices to the cloud and also remotely manage the lifecycle of these devices all the way from provisioning to remotely servicing them including the ability to perform remote software updates and if need be, decommission them. Wind River offers the Helix suite of products that reduces the complexities of building and managing an IoT solution. One such offering is Wind River Helix Device Cloud which is a device lifecycle management platform for Internet of Things (IoT). It greatly reduces the complexities of building and operating large scale device deployments. Helix Device Cloud provides the ability to continuously monitor the assets deployed on the field and remotely manage and service them for any incidents. This can significantly reduce the number of field trips of a service engineer to repair the device. This cloud platform can also be leveraged to collect valuable data from the assets, run analytics on the data for insights, make automated decisions and take action in real time thus enabling predictive maintenance and improve uptime of the device.

Mr. VidyaSagar, Business Head – IoT, Infotainment and Car HUD, Embitel Technologies

The core philosophy of IIoT revolution is the enablement of the next gen smart Human Machine Interfaces.

The IIoT enabled industrial, manufacturing, agricultural processes and supply chain systems make optimum utilization of the captured data to facilitate improvement in efficiency, productivity and new revenue sources for the businesses

From the technology perspective implementation of IIoT for the manufacturing processes can be categorized into three logical phases.

• Phase-1: Sensor networks and control systems: This facilitates to connect, monitor and control all the systems and processes of the assembly line or manufacturing unit. This helps the business to use the intelligent data thus collected to analyze and gain insights into their manufacturing processes and capacity utilization.
• Phase-2: Making operations semi-autonomous: Insights gained from sensor networks can be optimized to create semi-autonomous systems aided by smart Human Machine Interfaces (HMI). These IIoT enabled systemstake cognizance of their surrounding environment and processes as input data. Based on this data the IIoT systems operate autonomously to a limited extent. This phase enables manufacturers to optimize manufacturing and supply chain processes.
• Phase-3: Fully autonomous operations: When a business achieves this level of IIoT implementation, connected factories become the norm and fully autonomous factories become reality.

Thus an organization will be able to realize ultimate purpose of IIoT.

Throughout all the phases, one common by-product of implementation of IIoT is democratization of data i.e. on a need-to-know basis, everyone in the organization has same view of the data in real time. This enhances the decision-making capability of people, systems and processes

Our organization is currently working actively in implementation of Phase-1 and laying foundation for Phase-2 .

We work closely with our customers to provide M2M connectivity and data collection capability of new as well as legacy systems. We provide IoT solutions for remote monitoring and control of the devices, systems and processes.

As technology partners, we also provide consulting to our customer to help them select right connectivity technologies and hardware components.

We collaborate with global IIoT customers to design necessary hardware software, and mobile/web/PC applications. We also provide data analytics to derive useful insights.

In a nutshell, we are design partners for the development of a turnkey solution for the implementation of IIoT.

NI Debuts Industrial IoT Lab to Promote Innovation and Collaboration

NI recently announced  the opening of the new NI Industrial IoT Lab at its Austin headquarters. The NI Industrial IoT Lab focuses on intelligent systems that connect operational technology, information technology and the companies working on these systems. Designed with flexibility for the future, the lab’s operational focus includes areas such as microgrid control and communication, advanced control for manufacturing, and asset monitoring for heavy equipment.

Additionally, the NI Industrial IoT Lab fosters collaboration between different companies to improve interoperability. In this space, companies with expertise in communications protocols, controller hardware, I/O components, processing elements and software platforms come together to validate end-to-end solutions that can dramatically change the way businesses operate. Companies sponsoring the NI Industrial IoT Lab include: Analog Devices Inc, Avnu Alliance, Cisco Systems, Hewlett Packard Enterprise, Industrial Internet Consortium, Intel, Kalypso, OPC Foundation, OSIsoft, PTC, Real-Time Innovations, SparkCognition, Semikron, Viewpoint Systems and Xilinx.

To learn more about the new NI Industrial IoT Lab, please visit www.ni.com/iiot-lab.

Reliance and GE Team Up in the Industrial IoT India

Reliance Industries Limited and GE today announced the signing of a global partnership agreement in the Industrial IOT (IIOT) space whereby RIL and GE will work together to build out joint applications on GE’s Predix platform. The first-of-its-kind partnership marks the coming together of two of the world’s largest industrial conglomerates to provide IIOT solutions to customers in oil & gas, fertilizer, power, healthcare, telecom and other industries. GE will provide its Predix cloud offering, Industrial Internet applications and data science expertise. RIL will develop solutions on Predix as an Independent Software Vendor (ISV), bringing to bear its over 30 years of data, process and operational expertise. RIL will also offer nationwide connectivity infrastructure to customers through a 4G network powered by Jio. GE would offer the security, availability and monitoring aspects of the platform to RIL and its customers. The potential for other revenue streams includes telecom, healthcare and agriculture.

Emerson Launches industrial IoT offerings in India

Leveraging decades of digital automation expertise, Emerson recently launched its Operational Certainty program in India to help industrial companies achieve top performance in safety, reliability, production and energy management. This initiative is supported by Emerson’s Plantweb digital ecosystem designed to deliver Industrial Internet of Things (IoT) applications that offer measureable business performance improvement.

Emerson’s Operational Certainty is a technology and engineering-based program designed to help industrial companies achieve top performance and recover more than $ 1 trillion in operational losses globally. With its industry expertise, consulting services, comprehensive automation technologies and Industrial IoT solutions, Emerson is able to help customers extract greater value from their investments.