Industrial IT/OT convergence: The business benefits
22 March 2018
At Schneider Electric, we understand that the Industrial environment can benefit tremendously from the increased insights under the umbrella of the Internet of Things. Doing so, will involve a high level of cooperation between the IT and operational technology groups. Martin Walder, VP Industry at Schneider Electric, looks at working towards this IT/OT alignment.
There is a growing human obsession over the ability to remain connected at all times. Whether this be via a mobile phone, tablet device, a light bulb or even an energy resource, the demand and expectation is growing. As the IoT becomes engrained within the details of our everyday lives, we all expect deeper insights to help inform our daily lives. This is applicable to both the office, home or the industrial plant floor environment.
At Schneider Electric, we understand that the Industrial environment can benefit tremendously from the increased insights under the umbrella of the Internet of Things. Doing so, will involve a high level of cooperation between the IT and operational technology groups, in charge of monitoring the physical devices such as valves and pumps that use sensor technology. This trend, otherwise known as the Information Technology (IT) and Operational Technology (OT) convergence trend, allows analytics of real time and historical data for full control of the physical plant.
Working towards IT/OT alignment: The challenge
While IT is focused on storing and analysing data, OT focuses on simply making things work. For example, OT has long been established as hardware that detects or causes a real-time change through direct monitoring and control whereas IT has not historically provided data to affect the real-time control of operational plant.
With such established silos, the first challenge is to get everyone “singing from the same hymn sheet” and develop a language native to all. This will require establishing new processes, responsibilities and owners of architectures as maintenance and environmental demands of the technologies differ. Only with such clarity, will engineers be able to extract the most relevant data and utilise it in a way that benefits and informs all.
Achieving industrial security
Security is one of the biggest hurdles to overcome when connecting IT and OT. Security must become embedded within the systems. Further downtime can be eliminated by implementing centrally managed and monitored UPS (uninterruptable power supply) systems that are tied to hardware and software systems which are part of the entire network infrastructure environments.
Together, IT and OT can guarantee the highest availability of critical systems; OT ensuring the processes are always running and optimised and IT supporting the availability of hardware systems, always-on connectivity, cyber security, applications and data/analytics.
Working in real-time
By merging IT and OT together, engineers will gain access to the additional insights they now need. It will practically take real-time process control information and make it available at the business level, so rapid decisions can be made.
Integrating IT systems, such as Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) with OT systems like Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES) will help solve key business issues all plants face in terms of production efficiency, process reliability and safety. With heightened visibility and better insight of enterprise operations, new ways of collaboration between previously isolated groups can be established and full potential can be achieved.
Enhancing the business process of the future
Only when organisations dedicate significant investment into integrating IT with previous non-networking architectures like SCADA systems, will they encounter the ability to take real-time process control information and make it available for rapid business decision making.
Ultimately, aligning IT with OT will contribute to more informed decisions, productivity, sustainability and greater efficiency. This will be the key to ensuring maximum benefit can be gained from processes within a business and ensuring the longevity of a business’s health. Despite the challenges it may present in merging these two once very separate environments, with clear planning and communication, we at Schneider Electric believe that businesses can realise huge gains from these changing technology systems.
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