Repost, with Comments: LNS Research: Data: 43% of Manufacturing Professionals “Don’t Understand” the IoT

http://blog.lnsresearch.com/blog/bid/202628/data-43-of-manufacturing-professionals-dont-understand-the-iot?source=Blog_Email_%5bData%3A%2043%25%20of%20Manufac%5d

The LNS Research findings for IoT (Internet of Things) is not surprising given all of the hype around "talking refrigerators" and wearable devices.  It is sometimes difficult to connect the dots between a technology advance like a wearable, and a realistic use for manufacturers.  But let's think about this in another vein.  Manufacturing, for YEARS, has had IoT.  We called it DeviceNet, we called it OPC, programmically it was first DNA for Manufacturing and then .NET, but it was all about connecting the plant for communications.  Why?  To provide context into the information gathered, to be able to control the process and more importantly, predict when the process could get out of parameter.

The IoT, to me, is an extension of this paradigm. It brings other devices and entities into context to broaden, enrich and enhance the decision making capabilities of an enterprise. It's about using technology that makes sense to bring additional aspects within the environment that are integral to the process--for example, ambient temperature within a plant, or weather forecasts that could drive humidity to unacceptable levels in a process.

LNS's results indicate a need for continuing education, bringing "real life" examples and solutions to manufacturing that will help them gain additional productivity, quality, and competitive standing.  Like the cloud for manufacturing, first it's cool, but then it's a real provider of value, cost savings, and operations excellence.  IoT is in this nascent stage, so it's up to us as an industry to bring that education and value to our users.

Repost, with comments: Survey: Feds sacrificing billions in savings by skipping cloud

This survey discussion posted in SmartBriefs highlights the cost savings being ignored by the government not using the cloud for application hosting and user access.  It states that up to $19 billion could be saved by migrating services and applications to the cloud--$19 billion! 

Of course you'd say, well that would be insane for anyone to not take advantage of the benefits.  But I suspect that education and awareness has a lot to do with the indecision and/or inactivity of not going to the cloud. Not all agencies can be that tech savvy.  And, there is still a slight stigma of security when it comes to the cloud.  Regardless of infrastructure (and I use Microsoft Azure as an example) for triple-redundancy for high availability and security, no one can guarantee fault-free operations. 

So let's look at manufacturing cloud adoption.  A survey by LNS Research, as published in Manufacturing.net last October, showed a slight bump in the anticipated use of the cloud for plant software--around 17% of the respondents intended to use (or consider).  I'd still say this is a small percentage, but it's progress.  The benefits and cost savings for ERP using a cloud SaaS, as defined by Hudson IT, show over $2M in savings over 3 years--extrapolate that to Industrial automation users, and you could still see over a $1M savings (assuming that large, complex industrial automation projects run 50% of the cost of an ERP).

Wonderware has been working with Microsoft for well over three years now to bring solutions and knowledge of the cloud to industry. What have we found?  Well, the cloud is the delivery mechanism--but what customers really want is to make reporting and analysis easier, more accessible, and cheaper.  That's what the cloud does.  Maybe we need to call it "hosted" or "hands off reporting" in order to remove the stigma of what the cloud is perceived to be.  In reality, it's a productivity tool that provides users with unrestricted use of solutions to help them manage and execute their operations. Applications such as #SmartGlance and #Historian Online bring mobile reporting and analysis.  Do you think we should just drop the word "cloud?"  Let me know.
maryanne.steidinger@schneider-electric.com.