Smart Industry Crystal Ball Report 2021
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Technology REPORT 2021 Smart Industry Crystal Ball Report Predictions in a normal year are tricky. Predicting what is to come after a year of unprecedented volatility courtesy of a global pandemic is downright gutsy. But planning for next steps is wise, as is considering advice from experts in your field. Here find a collection of that advice…insights from dozens of industrial thought-leaders on what’s next, who’s involved, and what/why/how to charge into the new year with confidence. Sponsored by
Technology REPORT
CONTENTS
2021 holds greater collaboration among OEMs, owner-operators, and analytics providers 4
Two visible changes we will see in the modern factory in 2021 10
Enterprise applications cross the generational divide to alleviate the workforce crisis 13
The future of field service 15
Edge computing will bring visibility to three areas of the manufacturing supply chain in 2021 17
Outcome-as-a-Service in the coming year 22
This is no time to let our guard down 24
IT/OT integration is critical for answering the $77 billion need for IIoT 28
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Smart Industry: Tec hn ol ogy REPORT
2021 holds greater collaboration among OEMs,
owner-operators, and analytics providers
By Joe Becker, Uptake vice president of global business development
p In 2020, due to COVID-19 machine performance. As such, data integrity are issues that must
and the demands of remote work, more OEMs will honor warranties be addressed. These pressures have
we saw almost every business based on third-party analytics in forced open the door for digital
accelerate their digital-transforma- the new year. transformation, but have left many
tion journeys. organizations (built to operate and
Leveraging data in operations SHARED INDUSTRIAL maintain their owned machinery)
became paramount for OEMs CHALLENGES short on resources and capabili-
and owner-operators. In 2021, Operators across heavy indus- ties to tap into their reservoir of
Uptake expects to see growing tries face many of the same wealth: data.
collaboration among OEMs, own- fundamental challenges—rising The wind-power-generation
er-operators, and digital solution maintenance costs, greater regula- industry offers an illustrative exam-
providers as analytics empowers tory compliance, a wave of retiring ple of this dynamic. Investment
each market player to optimize workers, and the need to assure in renewable energy has expanded
The pandemic had few benefits to manufacturing, but
the successful adoption of remote work demonstrated a net
cost savings that will make manufacturers more competitive.
Expect remote work to continue, and to expand over 2021
and beyond. Remote workers can manage multiple projects,
including some they were previously incapable of managing
because of being locked down to one facility. Working
remotely has made it enticing for future generations to enter
the manufacturing sector since many don’t want to be tied
down. Historically, manufacturing has been hesitant toward
the remote worker; the pandemic has opened that window
for a future workforce who’s overlooked this industry.”
—Tyler Whitaker, L2L chief technology officer/chief operating officer
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Smart Industry: Tec hn ol ogy REPORT
First off, manufacturers will be requiring even the most basic
components, such as door switches or proximity sensors, to
be smart or network-capable. From a process perspective,
engineers are looking to harvest more data from individual
components to support increasingly complex and delicate
manufacturing processes. Smart components are also providing
a significant cost reduction in machine construction and
overall maintenance. With smart components on a network,
replacement of failed devices is literally plug-and-play.
Secondly, we are seeing increased use of AI to support new aspects
of manufacturing processes. Using AI in the cloud to monitor
and support manufacturing processes is nothing new. However,
manufacturers are now starting to pull AI out of the cloud and push
it onto the machine (the edge) in order to impact manufacturing
in real time on a specific machine. Another recently innovated
application of AI is for collaborative or adaptive safety. Various
industries are exploring how to leverage AI with new types of
safety-sensing technology to change the operation of a machine or
robot based on the position and activities of the operator. Instead
of having static hazard zones with fixed machine responses, these
new methods will constantly redefine the hazard zones based on
information from safety sensors and will adapt the operation of
the equipment to protect operators. The goal is to have a more
flexible workspace that lets operators shift production without
having to stop the machines and reset the production lines.”
—Todd Mason-Darnell, Ph.D. Omron Automation Americas
marketing manager—services & safety
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Smart Industry: Tec hn ol ogy REPORT
turbines under management for
many operators; this investment
has self-performing maintenance
feasible for the first time, resulting
in a decline in the OEM share of Entering 2021, we see an
the market for turbine maintenance. important digital transformation
As a result, precise performance around how the process industries
benchmarking is increasingly
manage the use and tracking of
important to operators and OEMs
mechanical seals. A major technology
who are looking to capture as much
used to seal rotating assets is the
productivity from their turbines
mechanical seal, historically treated
as possible through cost-effective
as a spare or consumable part. They
maintenance—especially given the
industry’s technician shortage.
are frequently not tracked in an EAM
or CMMS. To track a mechanical
DIFFERENT AND
seal in a CMMS or EAM, the seal
REINFORCING ROLES should be entered as a rotating
OEMs have pursued connectivity asset. Its removal for rebuilding
on assets like turbines, trucks, and or repair should be noted in the
pumps—whether through native program so that the mechanical
edge devices, embedded software, seal can be tracked in the software.
wireless connectivity or cloud In addition, some mechanical-seal
software—to differentiate their manufacturers have a barcode/app
machine offerings and enable IT/ system to aid plant teams in tracking
OT convergence for their long-es- mechanical seals and managing
tablished customer relationships. their inventory. The data from this
Operators, eager to stem rising system may be uploaded to the
costs and build out internal best EAM or CMMS. The information and
practices for maintenance, have
history gained will be the building
shown an appetite for analytics.
blocks of more successful seal
Many have various OEM rela-
deployment, more efficient inventory
tionships and have reached out to
management, and ultimately,
third party specialists to help clean,
improved rotating-asset reliability.”
compare, and analyze data from
mixed assets to provide indus- —Chris Wilder, Sealing Equipment
try-standard recommendations on Products Company, Inc. (SEPCO) CEO
how best to operate and maintain
their equipment.
Themselves overstretched to pro-
vide digital solutions, but wanting
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Smart Industry: Tec hn ol ogy REPORT
COVID=cloud. This shouldn’t be the first time you read or heard
that expression. For many reasons—ease of access by remote
employees, time to value for new solutions, and ability to bridge IT
and OT investments—end users ramped their cloud investments
in 2020 and jettisoned old timelines for cloud adoption. Cloud
computing was in fact the biggest winner of the year, if that can be
said during a pandemic that has killed so many and cost so much
in jobs and hope. For example, AWS revenue is now $49B and
growing 29% year over year. AWS revenue, in other words, is about
the same as Emerson’s market cap, or within shouting distance of
the combined market value of Rockwell, PTC, and AspenTech.
In 2021—for as much as we can predict—COVID might slow
down, but probably not cloud acceleration. The genie is out of the
bottle and isn’t going to be put back in. Cloud deployments and
‘workloads,’ which are how cloud companies refer to the categories
of tasks customers do on the cloud (such as storage, compute,
running ERP systems) are going to continue growing and will spill
over with regularity into the manufacturing side of organizations.
For plant managers or executives that haven’t met a cloud vendor
or considered how the cloud will benefit their efforts, they will
in 2021. Workloads for manufacturing like cross-plant rollups of
data, advanced analytics, machine learning and setting up virtual
operating centers that are now pilots or only deployed in forward-
leaning firms will become more commonplace. Another example
is re-platforming existing manufacturing workloads: both MSFT
and AWS would be happy to discuss how your OSIsoft PI system
could be run in their cloud vs. in your own IT data center.
Whereas the cloud once targeted IT workloads, the impact of
COVID=cloud is many workloads that have remained on-premise
will be cloud hosted within a year. No, that doesn’t mean DCS
and real time or close-loop processes, not yet anyway. But
the burden of proof will shift to those who argue for keeping
compute resources on premise, versus the other way around.”
—Michael Risse, Seeq chief marketing officer and vice president
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to ensure owner-operator satisfac-
tion as analytics drives efficiencies
and productivity, OEMs will call
The circular economy is putting
on these same specialists to mon-
itor asset conditions and validate
pressure on companies to re-examine
requests for maintenance. This is
their business processes; not only
especially important for customers
to improve quality and profitability,
running mixed fleets. but because an efficient supply
Since analytics solution providers chain consumes less energy, uses
span specific use cases from differ- fewer resources, and produces less
ent OEMs and across industries, waste. In short, gearing production
the scale, scope and indepen- toward sustainability is just good
dence of third-party analytics business for manufacturers.
have proven compelling to both
heavy-equipment operators and
Beyond processes, an increasing
manufacturers. More cost-effective
number of environmentally aware
warranty terms that reflect current
manufacturers are looking at their plants
and future operating conditions are and fixed assets to find ways of creating
unlocking significant value for both closed-loop operations. By upgrading or
owner-operators and OEMs. tuning plants and equipment, companies
can optimize their use of fossil fuel,
THE JOINT ANALYTICS eliminate waste, and reduce pollution.
APPROACH
I believe that in 2021, we will
Solution providers will fill the
analytics gap in enterprise digital
see a major acceleration among
transformation and build on the
manufacturing companies to find new
subject-matter expertise of their or reinvent existing processes that will
industrial counterparts. The adop- help them adapt their business to the
tion of an accessible, scaled form circular economy. This transformation
of industrial analytics from a third will create ripple effects well beyond
party relies on the continued shar- the manufacturing sector: consumers
ing of equipment data between the and the environment stand to benefit
parties. And as heavy industries from more efficiently produced goods,
scramble to cover the total cost of while enterprise-technology vendors
machine ownership end-to-end will have to rise to the challenge of
in the age of connectivity, the creating business software that can
bottom-line impact of machine handle a circular business model.”
analytics promises more direct col-
laboration among operators, OEMs —Colin Elkins, IFS vice president of manufacturing
and solution providers. p
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Cybersecurity: Security features will become a big differentiator
between automation platforms in the future. IT groups will
increasingly scrutinize traditional PLC & IDE’s norms, and
question why these systems do not support the same level of
security expected in IT based infrastructure. Forward-thinking
automation manufacturers will continue to blur the lines between
IT/OT by adopting open-source software wherever possible,
utilizing trusted computing chips, and supporting containerized
applications and certificate signing of all software deployments.
Software development: The army of new computer-science and future-
automation programmers that learned to program with Python &
JavaScript will naturally gravitate away from traditional IEC 61131-3/
Ladder-logic based programming and move toward platforms that
allow them to program in a modern way. In the future, many will learn
to program higher-level languages by watching YouTube and utilizing
online websites like Code Academy. Ultimately, industrial-control
systems will benefit from open-source software libraries and from better
change-control practices that are inherent with software repositories
like GitHub. The new tools and vast libraries available will result in more
rapid development cycles and cleaner code with better documentation.
Communication protocols: MQTT will begin to replace many traditional
brownfield communications protocols as hardware vendors begin to
offer devices with encrypted TLS data payloads over lightning-fast
network connections. Integrating a drive with a PLC, for example, will be
as simple as subscribing to the drive’s topic and parsing the namespace
with all its metadata. This will allow for seamless integration with cloud
platforms and their powerful digital-twin capabilities. Users in the future
will bemoan having to use antiquated protocols such as Modbus/TCP;
the notion of a gateway will also become unnecessary and redundant.
Advancements in microprocessors, especially embedded ARM varieties,
will allow for computing at the edge that few could have predicted.
These low power (yet still powerful) chips will make all devices
smart, and encrypted MQTT is the obvious protocol of the future.”
—Kurt Braun, WAGO IIoT market specialist
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Two visible changes we will see in the modern
factory in 2021
By Lawrence Whittle, Parsable CEO
p Despite the challenges the past pivots in production. The ability Gone will be the six-inch paper
year has created in manufacturing, to rapidly onboard new workers, binders—they’ll disappear and that
it may have accelerated some of the quickly adjust for new processes, will bring a new era in manufactur-
key changes we can expect to see and roll out new procedures across ing that is far more agile.
on the plant floor in 2021. teams and sites has been an enor-
To start, technology and soft- mous challenge for manufacturers MOBILE TECHNOLOGY
ware will continue to rapidly still stuck on paper. WILL BE IN THE HANDS
transform the industry. In 2021, In 2021, manufacturers will OF EVERY WORKER
I predict that the gains in pro- finally say good-bye to paper for Another major shift will be the
ductivity, quality and safety due good and replace it with digital democratization of technology; every
to software will be immediately tools that enable workers to ramp frontline worker will have access to
obvious to the human eye, and will up productivity and help businesses digital tools that help them be safer
physically change how work gets respond quickly to new trends. and more productive. If 2020 has
done on the factory floor.
PAPER WILL MAKE AN EXIT
Paper’s days are numbered. His- Machine learning and AI will
torically, the manufacturing world expedite decarbonization in carbon-
has run on paper-based systems heavy industries. Warehouse managers
for training, record keeping and will implement mobile edge computing
task management. However, the to keep up with 50% more orders as
challenges of COVID-19 in 2020 a result of current and post-COVID
have exposed the inefficiencies online-shopping trends. Automated
with using paper-based procedures
safety monitoring will save businesses
for any work on the plant floor.
millions in workers’ compensation
Among many downsides, paper
costs. Increasing use of video and other
reduces agility and can’t be updated
high-resolution, high-bandwidth sensors
in real-time when there is a better
will increase demand for edge AI.”
way of performing the work, or
when standards and rules change. —Sastry Malladi, FogHorn CTO covering
Pandemic-induced swings in IIoT, AI, and edge computing
supply and demand require quick
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taught us anything, it is that many Frontline factory workers will Industry 4.0 will not just be
frontline workers were not always increasingly be connected, digitally, reserved for machines. Successful
equipped with the tools and technol- through hand-held mobile devices organizations will look at 2021 as
ogy to stay safe on the job, or do their and tablets that enable them, a time to reset and build the right
jobs effectively in times of uncer- through easy-to-use software and foundation for digital transforma-
tainty and constraint. Changing applications, to do work effectively tion—and that foundation must
this reality for workers will be top of and in compliance with standards, include empowering their human
mind for leaders and will become a all while being able to collaborate workers. p
strategic business priority. with experts and teammates.
Manufacturers realize that there is too much value
leaking away due to sub-optimal operating performance.
Value is leaking away from unplanned shutdowns, equipment
that is not properly tuned to current conditions, and the plant
not living up to its potential. Going forward they will more
aggressively engage with the contractors that designed and
built their plants for advice and counsel on how to get the
greatest ROI from their assets. Contractors will leverage
their engineering expertise as well as knowledge about the
technologies employed to boost their value add to the plant
owners. Services employed will include predictive maintenance,
plant revamps, and updates of plant models used in planning
and scheduling. This is a win-win: plant owners will get more
from their assets and their contractors will keep key staff
engaged while increasing customer intimacy and knowledge
of how their designs and technologies are performing.”
—Paul Donnelly, AspenTech EPC industry marketing director
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Enterprise applications cross the generational
divide to alleviate the workforce crisis
By Tom Brennan, Rootstock Software CMO
p For better or worse, COVID- more akin to the social media older applications to the cloud was
19 has driven home the need for and mobile apps that younger a good start, but they still aren’t
applications that can support remote generations, like Millennials and inherently pleasing to Millennials
workers. Collaboration products Generation Z, have grown up using. or Gen Z. This is about to change
such as Zoom, Teams and Slack No doubt these collaboration with the adoption and incorpora-
have filled the void to help remote tools are changing the way we tion of collaboration tools that have
employees get work done without work, but what about workhorse the “hip” look and feel of social
stepping into an office or a plane. enterprise applications such as media and mobile apps.
Interestingly enough, these col- CRM or stodgy apps like ERP? For example, Salesforce’s acqui-
laboration tools are now used by Are these apps going to make sim- sition of Slack is not your garden
everyone from kindergartners to ilar changes and modernize? Will variety $27.7 billion dollar trans-
grandparents, and in some ways, they get Gen Z’d as well? action. It has wider ramifications
have become as ubiquitous as To be clear, acquiring young that signals a change in how all
smartphones. In fact, to lower the talent who will work on old ERP applications will be built and
adoption barrier, some collabora- systems is a real issue. Younger used, including CRM and ERP.
tion-tool vendors offer entry-level people don’t find their father’s With collaboration tools becom-
apps for free. These tools are much ERP appealing. Moving these ing intrinsic components of a
In times of crisis, the infrastructure and supply
chains that underpin modern society—agriculture, food and
beverage manufacturing, pharmaceutical development—
go into hyperdrive. This means that 2021 must be the
year we start planning for worst-case scenarios to ensure
the uptime and security of these critical systems now
and well into the future. Whether it be ransomware or a
rogue USB, the threats to OT cannot be understated.”
—Marty Edwards, Tenable vice president of OT
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cloud platform, the lines will blur instantaneous, mobile and conver- for free. This means companies
between apps and business stal- sational. Companies can redesign can set up digital connections with
warts like CRM and ERP. how they work with employees, customers and suppliers easier than
Imagine these collaboration tools as well as customers and suppliers ever before.
integrated with ERP capabilities outside their virtual walls. Con- While ERP and CRM aren’t
and the treasure trove of low-code ventional ERP can transition from designed for kindergarteners,
configuration tools recently made being internally focused to a cloud- they’re agile and continually
available on cloud platforms that driven platform that enables secure evolving, so when these little tikes
allow businesspeople (or citizen interactions with external stake- enter the workforce, these tools
developers as they are now known) holders. The supply-and-demand will provide the expected user
to create mobile apps, design work- chains then become dynamic and experience. Meanwhile, these tools
flows, and add analytics and AI resilient to market forces. are intuitive and user-friendly
within the ERP. Now imagine how Another reason this spanning of enough for adoption by still-in-
exponentially powerful these capa- generations can more easily occur the-workforce Baby Boomers, and
bilities can be when also leveraging is the ubiquity of collaboration their increasingly collaborative,
collaboration tools. tools. Getting systems to talk to app-like nature is increasingly
As a result, these bastions one another isn’t a barrier. Anyone attracting Millennials and Gen
of enterprise solutions become can utilize these tools…oftentimes Zers alike. p
A swell of interest in remote-monitoring technologies
in response to the COVID-19 pandemic has increased the
scale of data collection in industrial operations, a trend we
expect to persist in the coming year as these technologies
dig their heels in. But with abundant data comes a slew of
challenges, and one in particular that we’re watching for 2021
is privacy. New approaches like homomorphic cryptography,
which allows encrypted data to be analyzed without decrypting
it, can put this data to work without compromising privacy.
Such privacy-preserving techniques for AI will see rising
adoption in 2021, and while the most immediate impact
will be in consumer and health applications, the same
technologies will make their mark on industrial applications,
as industrial data sharing becomes more prevalent.”
—Katrina Westerhof, Lux Research director of research
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The future of field service
By Kieran Notter, ServiceMax vice president of global customer transformation &
Sumair Dutta, ServiceMax senior director of digital transformation
p While none of us could have parties) up and down for surges REMOTE SUPPORT AND OTHER
successfully predicted the themes or dips in demand. This continues ENGAGEMENT MODELS
for 2020, this year has been full of to be important, but there is an The technology to deliver expertise
innovative approaches to work we increased desire to really tap into remotely has matured quite signifi-
see shaping the way chief service the capacity and skillsets of the cantly and service organizations
officers approach field service in existing service workforce. Can the have been happy to experiment
2021 and beyond. Here are things idle time of highly skilled workers with these tools to support their
we expect a lot more of from ser- be used to train or remotely internal employees and custom-
vice leaders in 2021: support less skilled service ers. Now, the opportunity arises
agents? And can these less-skilled to truly inject remote into the
FLEXIBILITY OF THE service agents be trained on the organization’s DNA. From a
SERVICE WORKFORCE most commonly required service customer-facing perspective, orga-
In past years, the discussion about processes and then be upskilled nizations will focus on monetizing
service-resource flexibility has with on-demand learning and remote services and developing
focused on quantity and the ability collaboration tools as and when the contracts and entitlements focused
to scale (with the aid of third need arises? specifically on remote support.
Moving forward, there will be no OT without IT,
and securing these newly converged environments will
be critical. 2021 will be the era of widespread IT and OT
convergence—whether that be intentional or accidental.
Unfortunately, many organizations will likely learn the hard
way that their OT is no longer air-gapped, as cybercriminals
continue to search for attack vectors. IT will be a conduit to
compromising sensitive OT environments and vice versa.”
—Barak Perelman, Tenable vice president of OT security
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The remote mode of connection point-to-point solutions to solve Acceptable outcome-
with customers will also spur new specific problems. That said, ser- based offerings
engagement ideas and offerings vice organizations recognize that Conceptually, outcome-based
while raising interesting concerns the strategic value of AI is tied to services make a lot of sense.
around liability and compliance. the quality of data that is currently That said, it is very difficult
From the workforce-enablement available in their organizations. for organizations to pivot to
perspective, there will be a greater To drive better AI-supported pro- the provision of the services,
emphasis on the organization and jections and recommendations, particularly if it involves the
management of the remote expert organizations will continue to cannibalization of existing (and
workforce to drive improved reach improve their data capture and seemingly safe) revenue streams or
and scale. organization particularly around the greater buy in from functions
information on the asset—failure outside of service. This isn’t holding
HERE ARE AREAS WHERE causes, service actions required, back forward-thinking CSOs from
WE WILL SEE INCREMENTAL part history and more. These navigating routes to an outcome-
IMPROVEMENTS: organizations are interested in based future, either by offering an
Data cleansing and preparation the development of a common increased portfolio of managed
for future AI investments service language that makes services that are outcome-focused
The number of use cases for AI it easier to record and analyze or by experimenting with outcome-
continues to grow, and so does data for improved efficiency and based contracts with a handful of
the overall interest in these better performance. customers or assets. p
For many companies, digital
transformation has been accelerated due
to a response to the global pandemic.
Companies are also keenly aware of
the need to reduce waste, focus on
process improvement, and increase
operating rigor. Solutions that safely
connect workers to the enterprise are
powerful drivers to enable business
continuity and growth in 2021.”
—Pat Byrne, GE Digital CEO
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Edge computing will bring visibility to three areas
of the manufacturing supply chain in 2021
By Jason Andersen, Stratus Technologies vice president of business line management
p Over the past year, supply chains into 2021, it will be a continued While manufacturers have long
have been incredibly stretched balancing act as the global econ- dealt with disparate systems and
and often disrupted. Some man- omy cautiously opens and consumer data across ERP, warehousing,
ufacturers were challenged to demand fluctuates, depending on supply chain, or POS systems, the
meet overwhelming demand with COVID outbreaks and the success fluidity of the market and human
significantly limited resources and of vaccines. resources has underscored the value
fewer workers, whereas others All of this has increased focus and of real-time data for insight.
were forced to scale back or shut discussion about how manufacturers 2021 will be a year where edge
down due to drops in demand. In can increase automation and visibil- computing gets deployed for supply
either case remote visibility and/ ity on their supply chains to more chain visibility in three key areas—
or access to the supply chain has effectively meet customer demand manufacturing execution, inventory
been a major challenge. Heading and enable operational resilience. management, and point-of-sale.
Organizations were forced to ask their employees to take
on more responsibility in managing the 2020 pandemic. Rather
than retracting that responsibility in 2021, industry leaders will
continue to extend that reliance on the frontline to accelerate
performance. A concerted effort to build teams that incorporate
more diverse backgrounds and perspectives will be a priority
and an important part of driving sustainable performance
improvements. Investments to improve people, processes, and
products will be evaluated on their ability to impact operational
performance over an extended period of time. 2021 will be
another year for learning and adapting to unprecedented
circumstances. For those that can build on the experiences
of 2020 and be open to new information, perspectives, and
technologies, next year will be filled with opportunities.”
—Errette Dunn, Rever CEO
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In order to keep up with modern customer demands and economic
shifts in 2021, manufacturers of complex goods will increasingly
digitalize and move to a customer-driven, online-selling model.
One critical technology will make online sales possible for complex
manufactured products: configure-price-quote technology. Without
it, no major manufacturer will be able to sell their products across
all channels, and competitors will steamroll right over them.
Here’s why: buyers of complex or heavy-duty goods—think
huge farming equipment or complex medical machines—aren’t
looking for standard products. They need highly customized,
highly configured machines. Manufacturers need to make
those adjustments translate across all the ripple effects of
customization, and then through the negotiation and purchasing
phases (think engineering, suppliers, pricing, manufacturing).
The process has traditionally required a herculean effort full of
manual processes, in-person meetings, paper spreadsheets,
outdated catalogs, and costly rework, all rife with the potential for
human error. But this sales model crumbled over the past year.
Buyers began demanding consumer-like ease and came to expect
automated, online interactions and real-time price adjustments.
Also, COVID-19 amplified demand for online interactions, forcing
buyers and sellers to move away from in-person meetings.
There’s no going back—in 2021 manufacturers will
continue to revamp their sales processes to remove
all the complexities of traditional methods. Those
that move slowly, or not at all, will not survive.”
—Bo Gyldenvang, Tacton CEO
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Manufacturing execution and
production. While companies
aspire to build digital factories and Looking ahead to 2021 and
enable smart manufacturing, many
beyond, it’s not necessarily the
are burdened with varying levels
technology itself that will make the
of automation and digitalization,
biggest impact on manufacturers, but
and wrestle with broad and holis-
rather how well organizations deploy
tic visibility on manufacturing
and manage their digital assets. In
operations. This is exacerbated
by the need to solve for real-time
short, the success of a manufacturer’s
plant-floor visibility with fewer
digital investments hinges on the
employees. Edge computing
organization’s larger people strategy:
extends manufacturing-execution recruiting, retaining and reinventing
systems to the equipment to deliver talent as Industry 4.0 unfolds.”
that visibility without the complex-
—Rocky Subramanian, SAP North American
ity of mission-critical IT systems. managing director, Midwest region
For high-velocity production lines
or complex production processes,
the proximity of computing power edge computing is a high-value understand point-of-sale demand
will be a game changer for mon- investment with less than eight- to optimize distribution and pro-
itoring production and enabling month payback that manufacturers duction planning.
issue escalation. will pursue in 2021.
Inventory management and Point-of-sale and transactions. EDGE COMPUTING WILL
warehousing. Manufacturers have Point-of-sale transactions, par- POWER SUPPLY CHAIN
already been on a path of increased ticularly in CPG, have remained VISIBILITY IN 2021
automation in warehousing and a blindspot for manufacturers to Edge computing will be a top
inventory management. That will manage inventory and distribution, investment by manufacturers to
continue to accelerate as zero-touch and plan manufacturing, due to increase visibility and operational
and remote monitoring become the complexity of high volumes of resilience across manufacturing
requirements as manufacturers look data, and lack of local compute and operations, inventory, material
to scale back essential workers and connectivity required to monitor handling, and delivery in response
increasingly deploy new solutions and process information. In B2B, to COVID and future disruptions.
such as robotics. Ruggedized companies are deploying edge While business continuity used to
edge-computing platforms that are computing to monitor logistics mean moving production data and
purpose-built for edge locations transactions at remote edge loca- models into the cloud for access
are ideal for material handling tions and even share that data in anywhere, in 2021 manufacturers
and warehousing applications. real time with business partners. will be looking to deliver business
The ability to integrate In 2021, companies will similarly continuity and supply chain resil-
manufacturing operations and to deploy zero-touch edge computing ience by acquiring data and insight
process the associated data with to address blindspots in retail to from the edge. p
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- 19-Smart Industry: Tec hn ol ogy REPORT
While jolting, recent changes enabled by work-from-home technologies
like MS Teams and Zoom are now more fully exposed and understood for
what they enable. They’ve demonstrated (again?) the burgeoning potency
of technologies as enablers to our products and processes, our systems
and solutions, our interfaces and interactions. We’re getting used to their
usefulness for overcoming our distance and time away from one another.
With two or more minds meeting simultaneously, instantaneously, on
screens, office technologies applied out of necessity have prompted
rapid adaptation and learning. However, the inrush of new individual
know-how, skill and faith in using these tools ‘in the convenience
of our own homes’ has also supported group engagement in
meaningful dialog and development of common understandings. We
have more opportunities to synchronize on what makes goals and
issues common to everyone involved. Once aligned, technologies
also enable rapid collaboration to express and overcome commonly
understood issues. Team efforts orchestrate and unify while
nurturing a sense of ownership and common achievement. Given
our new, hard-earned knowledge and know-how, there will be less
tolerance for functional silos or digital divides in the enterprise.
In the industrial space, this intolerance will more rapidly erode the
perceived divisions between OT and IT. Needs to expand expertise will
dissolve protected niches as technologies merge through concepts
like the digital twin and digital thread. While enabling ‘living’ digital
models, these concepts will merge into the work-lives and mindsets of
employees. Open platforms, common network protocols, robust and
reasoned security and governance will allow data to serve as joinery
among multiple actors in their work together—on projects, while cross-
checking actions and purposes, and while growing in understanding
of where and how each other plays in the achievement of common
goals. Secure openness and data democratization within and between
enterprises will free the information that enables human and artificial
intelligence, and supports better decision-making and agility. However,
a growing intolerance of our separation will be the needle that continues
to first perforate silos, then draw them together with the threads of
knowledge we’ve shared and come to appreciate from one another.”
—Louis Grice, Phoenix Contact USA vice president of digitalization
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@StratusAlwysOnSmart Industry: Tec hn ol ogy REPORT
Outcome-as-a-Service in the coming year
By Kevin Finnan, Yokogawa industry marketing consultant
p Rather than disrupting the tech- A trend leading into 2020, the through the past year, is evolving
nological innovations that had been outcome-orientation concept puts to a network of connected digital
predicted for 2020, the pandemic today’s broad array of disruptive twins. Instead of extreme scaling
greatly accelerated adoption of technologies into perspective by such as from a process unit to an
concepts such as digital transfor- urging engineers to focus on out- entire facility, process operators are
mation, augmented reality (AR), comes instead of technology. The deploying connected digital twins,
and secure remote access. It also disruptions caused by the pandemic which focus on varying purposes—
brought other initiatives into finer have only refined that focus to the while continuing to be scalable. For
focus—and they will accelerate point that suppliers are trending example, instead of incorporating
new technology deployment in the toward outcome-as-a-service port- deep knowledge of the chemistry
coming year. folios for 2021. in a process unit into a digital twin
Outcome orientation will Connected digital twins. The that mirrors the human operator,
evolve to outcome-as-a-service. scalable digital twin, proven emulation of the two, separate
Predictions: Field service, asset-management
scheduling and route-optimization engines will be driven by
artificial intelligence/machine learning. For service and asset-
intensive industries, just-in-time parts delivery will happen
via drones. Your utility will evolve to be a one-stop shop for
your home services (E-commerce storefront, installation,
repair and monitoring services, etc.). Your utility may also
begin providing your 5G-based internet in direct competition
to Telcom. Renewables will become a major distributed-
energy source. AI/ML, IoT and thermal-imaging technologies
coupled with modern cloud-based field service and asset-
based scheduling systems will be able to forecast most of
the extreme weather-induced wildfires. The use of paper for
field-service schedules, reports and notes will be eliminated.”
—Vikram Takru, KloudGin CEO
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- 22-Smart Industry: Tec hn ol ogy REPORT
entities (the process unit and duties such as routine inspection Edge-enabling communica-
human operator) could take place rounds and incident investigations. tions trends. Underpinning digital
in separate but interconnected dig- A robot could enter a hazardous transformations are two technol-
ital twins. area that would be very risky to a ogies that will enable the rapid
Formerly disparate, disruptive human or one that would require migration from legacy, plant-floor
technologies will work together. lengthy preparation of personal networks and protocols to a digi-
Meanwhile, rather than com- protection equipment (PPE). A talized future.
peting with technologies such as drone can replace a human who Private 5G cellular will enable
machine learning (ML), first prin- would need to climb a very tall wireless consolidation of such
ciples-based digital twins will work ladder. The robots do not necessar- widely disparate technologies as
with them. The convergence of first ily replace people, but allow them proprietary, spread-spectrum radio,
principles models and ML can help to perform tasks with higher value WiFi and earlier-generation cellu-
with data gaps. This is a revolution- while significantly reducing risks. lar communications. Meanwhile,
ary approach to solving problems A robot or drone on an inspec- the advent of a protocol-agnos-
Mobile robots will transition tion round would communicate tic, Ethernet advanced physical
from marginal to mainstream in not only with the control system, layer (Ethernet-APL) provides an
process-industry applications. asset-management application and incredible opportunity to digitally
The pandemic has accelerated cloud-based analytics but would transform field-device commu-
process-industry robotics trends. also work with a human who could nications by replacing ISA100,
While staff works from home in visualize and control all operations Modbus, PROFIBUS PA, and
2021, on-site robots could fulfill from a remote location. Wireless HART. p
Consumer habits at home tend to trickle down to
work; we are noticing that the adoption of tablets at work
is increasing. New employees are more likely to easily
adopt tablets—no matter their age—than the existing
workforce. Tablets are lightweight, easy to carry and
easy to use, and give the field workforce an all-in-one
place to gather data, enter it in forms, take pictures and
upload information instantaneously. Improvements in mobile
technology and data speeds also play a huge role in this shift
to the tablet as a work tool. As the improvements to technology
continue, both for mobile devices and tablets, we will continue
to see the trend of shifting away from PCs to tablets.”
—Vamsi Alla, Think Power Solutions CTO
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- 23-Smart Industry: Tec hn ol ogy REPORT
This is no time to let our guard down
By Rick Peters, Fortinet North America CISO for operational technology
p The traditional network perime- digital transformation. As a result, cyber-criminals involved in terror-
ter has been replaced with multiple in the coming year there will be ism, espionage and cyber-warfare.
edge environments, WAN, multi- an increased focus on securing the That threat landscape continues to
cloud, data center, IoT and remote edge, which requires a converged grow, unfortunately. Historically,
workers, and more. Each of these focus on security and networking. most OT environments have been
surfaces carry unique risks in terms IT and OT will continue to con- siloed. The air gap between the
of security. This gives cybercrimi- verge, and for this to happen safely OT network and the rest of the IT
nals a significant advantage: these and successfully, security and net- environment has protected them,
edges, interconnected, yield an working will need to come together much like a wide ocean protects the
expanded attack surface which as well. species of a remote island. Many of
many organizations are unable to these OT systems use legacy tech-
secure properly. Instead, organiza- ICS AND SCADA SYSTEMS nology, with little or no internal
tions have deprioritized centralized BECOME BIGGER TARGETS security, making them vulnerable
visibility and unified control in ICS and SCADA systems to exploitation. Connecting with
favor of optimal performance and have become juicier targets for an IT network opens up these OT
If edge computing was the buzz for 2019 and 2020,
2021 will be all about artificial intelligence at the endpoint.
As data requirements continue to skyrocket from the use
of IoT devices and sensors, intelligence at the endpoint will
help enterprises and OEMs better process, manage and store
this data in new ways. This, in turn, will help them increase
efficiency and save money. Additionally, 2021 will be the
year that the industry realizes that IoT is merely a vehicle
for data. Automation will change business models. Endpoint
devices will become increasingly smarter. Cloud data
transmission costs will increase dramatically. And predictive
maintenance will top manufacturing pain points in 2021.”
—Yasser Khan, ONE Tech CEO
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- 24-Smart Industry: Tec hn ol ogy REPORT
Enabled by reliable, high-performance 5G connectivity and real-
time edge computing capabilities, enterprises will more rapidly
implement AI technology to support various use cases across
their organizations, including robotic assembly lines, autonomous
vehicles, augmented-reality training, and more. These intelligent,
AI-driven solutions will automate traditional, manual processes
to increase performance and visibility while lowering cost.
In 2021, manufacturers will lay the groundwork for company-
wide, cost-effective industrial automation. Over the next five
years, we will see these industries completely transform
themselves due to the automating power of real-time AI.
We will see a substantial increase in 5G trial initiatives by
enterprises over the next 12 months, especially in verticals such
as manufacturing, energy and surveillance, to enable mission-
critical applications that require low latency. In 2021, consumer
handsets will remain the most widely adopted 5G use case,
focused on allowing faster data speeds for users, before being
overtaken by enterprise applications in 2022. These enterprise
and industrial deployments will offer more radical disruptions and
significant value-added services and apps associated with 5G. They
will utilize new attributes and properties, such as Ultra-Reliable
Low Latency Communications (URLLC), Massive-Machine Type
Communications (MMTC), and private bands, which are uniquely 5G.
Efforts like CBRS and O-RAN will allow enterprises to deploy
private 5G networks at lower operating price points, allow new
providers to enter the market, and bridge the digital divide.
We may see traditional consumer 5G vendors entering the
enterprise space, but these companies will struggle to pivot
away from the traditional consumer markets based on available
internal resources and expertise. Incumbents will certainly
not ignore the enterprise market; however, they are not likely
to put all their eggs in that basket as newer players will.”
—Vinay Ravuri, EdgeQ CEO
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- 25-Smart Industry: Tec hn ol ogy REPORT
systems to cyber-attacks and malware they
are unprepared to defend. Security pro-
fessionals must keep a close eye on these
systems, not just those in factories and
manufacturing plants, but also those in In 2021, we’ll see digital
critical infrastructure like power plants and innovation and investment spike
water-treatment systems. among service providers. Those
who’ve already made progress
SMART INFRASTRUCTURE
on their digital -transformation
BRINGS ADVANTAGES BUT
journeys will be looking to build
INCREASED ATTACK VECTORS
upon their strong foundation—
IoT is disrupting the building industry,
and those who have lagged
along with declining costs of sensors and
cloud computing. More organizations are
will work hard to catch up.
retrofitting or building out new structures
2021 will be a race to digital,
with smart infrastructure. This comes
with the spoils going to those
with many benefits, but also security organizations that can maintain
risks. Smart infrastructure has new and the momentum built up during
vulnerable endpoints that must secured their response to the pandemic.”
properly. Organizations will need to take a
—Sarah Nicastro, IFS field-service evangelist
security-first approach to deploying smart
infrastructure technology. Having a long-
term strategy for both physical security and
cybersecurity is more important than ever.
This year put a spotlight
RANSOMWARE IS PROLIFERATING on the gaping skills shortages
AND GROWING MORE SOPHISTICATED we are facing. Because of this,
This has been a banner year for bad actors when it comes to technical
deploying ransomware against organiza-
skills, organizations are set to
tions of many types, including schools,
raise their standard baseline
hospitals and manufacturers. Ransomware
of knowledge. Organizations
is continuing to evolve, making it one of
will need to reskill employees
the most damaging threats facing orga-
and focus on digital literacy.”
nizations today. As networked systems
increasingly intersect with critical infra- —Flemming Goldbach, LMS365
structure systems, this worrisome trend vice president of product
places more data, devices and even lives at
risk. Organizations will have to increase
their security posture. 2021 will not be a
time to let one’s guard down. p
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- 26-Smart Industry: Tec hn ol ogy REPORT
Supply chains will need to be digitized given the new normal,
and these efforts will be powered by cloud-based IGA platforms
to govern access. This demand is being seen across industries,
but more significantly within manufacturing. The new normal of
remote home working will be permanent for many employees and
organizations. This means organizations need to rethink their fine-
grained access model; getting a better handle on the fine-grained
policies that need to be implemented for a long-term remote
setup can be the foundation for introducing automation of identity
management and provisioning. With that work in place, modernizing
IGA and reducing the need for human intervention through
automation will be key needs in 2021. Companies will need to seek
an IGA solution that can govern that granularity on a daily basis.
2021 will be a year where several legacy solutions hit the wall
and/or are out of service. Legacy solutions can’t meet their
business requirements any more, and companies will find
these products are no longer supported as the need for digital
transformation intensifies. This will drive demand for modern
cloud-based IGA solutions to replace legacy products.”
—Morten Boel Sigurdsson, Omada founder and president of North America
www.S m a r t I nd us t r y.c om
- 27-Smart Industry: Tec hn ol ogy REPORT
IT/OT integration is critical for answering the
$77 billion need for IIoT
By Keith Higgins, Rockwell Automation vice president of digital transformation
p Most manufacturers plan Data produced on the factory organizations can generate pre-
to increase their investment in floor needs to maintain its rich dictive insights and operational
smart-factory technology over the context (such as process conditions, excellence across the enterprise.
next year. As IIoT sensors pro- time stamps, machine states, and By applying context to data pulled
duce 1.44 billion data points per other production states) to provide from the factory floor, OT teams
plant per day, IT/OT integration maximum insights to factory staff. will create more powerful analyt-
is critical to improving operational Previously, aggregating the data ics to better understand the data
efficiency while accelerating success generated by machines in processes and how it impacts the machines,
through digital-transformation ini- required significant manual effort lines, plants, and processes they
tiatives. However, enterprises have and pulling information from many are responsible for. In 2021, IT/
traditionally been challenged with disparate sources. Instead, by auto- OT integration will directly impact
converting real-time, historic OT matically capturing high-speed, whether enterprises remain or
data from legacy systems into high- contextualized OT data from become more competitive in the
er-level IT insights. industrial controllers in real-time, global manufacturing landscape.
Legacy oil & gas companies will change how they recruit
and hire based on the implementation of digital-transformation
projects. AI will increasingly benefit the upstream oil & gas
industry through the democratization and localization of
specialized knowledge in well operations, where domain-
expert knowledge and experience are extremely valuable,
yet scarce. COVID-19 will jumpstart the long-awaited digital
transformation and AI adoption in many upstream oil &
gas organizations. In 2021, we’ll see many more oil & gas
companies with actual AI deployments across the entire
organization, at the operational scale and in productization.”
—Michael Krause, PhD, Beyond Limits data scientist
www.S m a r t I nd us t r y.c om
- 28-Smart Industry: Tec hn ol ogy REPORT
Digital transformation requires a best-of-breed solution ecosystem.
An ecosystem of technologies, solution providers and architects
will be key for powering successful digital transformation
initiatives in 2021. Organizations will favor open architecture
platforms to unite the best features of various IT, OT and
engineering technology (ET) solutions over leveraging a single
provider with a narrower tech stack, which can have limitations
and impede results. What’s more, by leveraging best-of-breed
solutions and partners, businesses can create a closed-loop
system to further improve outcomes by sharing input and output
data across the ecosystem to continuously adapt to shifting
conditions or constraints. By sharing information, organizations
can minimize time, reduce effort and eliminate redundancy.
Artificial intelligence becomes less artificial in 2021. In the new
year, remote work will continue, social-distancing requirements
will remain, and supply chains will continue to face disruption. This
new way of life demands a new way for companies to continue
operations effectively across the value chain—from the product
to the plant to the end user. The use of artificial intelligence (AI)
will be the standard for addressing these challenges. In 2021,
enterprises will take a human-centered approach to AI initiatives,
understanding user needs and values, then adapting AI designs
and models accordingly, which will in turn, improve adoption.
Prescriptive analytics will be a key component for digital-
transformation success. For AI to have a significant impact
across the value chain, prescriptive analytics will be the catalyst
to optimize performance. Prescriptive analytics will become an
essential piece for scaling AI within organizations, by leveraging
product and customer data to advise AI models on how to improve
processes, adjust production and increase efficiency. Going beyond
predictive analytics to prescriptive analytics will ultimately enable
digital transformation success for manufacturers in 2021.”
—George Young, Kalypso global managing director
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- 29-You can also read
