Panduit betting on IoT for industrial manufacturing

The inexorable rise of the Internet of Things (IoT) is resulting in significant growth for IT businesses around the world, but it is also producing opportunities for operational technology (OT) manufacturers in equal measure.  

While attending Panduit's Global System Integrators Congress (GSIC) in Nayarit, Mexico, earlier this month, BNamericas had the opportunity to speak to the company's CEO and President, Tom Donovan, and Executive VP, Matthew O'Sullivan, to discuss how Panduit is applying its knowledge of IoT to real-world industrial scenarios.

"Within the evolving IT/OT convergence, we see the continued use of Ethernet for the plant floor as we move from proprietary to open standards," said O'Sullivan. "EDGE [Enhanced Data GSM Environment] network technology is also playing its part, and is a platform for capturing data and turning it into action," he added.

Donovan pointed out the presence of a knowledge gap in terms of IP [Internet Protocol] and Ethernet usage in the industrial environment, explaining that this presents a real barrier to IoT adoption. However, he was quick to confirm that Latin America has potential.

"Latin America and Mexico are interesting markets because they developed differently to the US. In other areas of the world, there's a distinct and distant separation between OT and IT, but here they're much closer, enabling companies like us to move much faster toward our goals."

Panduit has been working closely with Cisco on the IT side and Rockwell Automation on the OT side. Manufacturing has become a key area of focus for Cisco and Rockwell, with both companies strong believers that IoT is the future.

The three companies were the founding members of Industrial IP Advantage, which is an organization that promotes industrial IP education and awareness through online training activities. According to O'Sullivan, "these [training activities] help to fill any knowledge gaps and are a key part of our strategic alliance with Cisco and Rockwell."

SMART CITIES

On the topic of smart cities, Donovan underlined that "with 50bn devices now connected, IoT will become a necessary requirement for cities in the future. As a government, you can't afford not to protect your citizens, and when you see that the capabilities of IoT can help with that, there will be social pressure to develop IoT solutions."

"Smart cities are nothing more than data generation and analysis. The heavy lifting that goes into that type of environment is happening in a data center. All of Cisco's data centers are built with Panduit infrastructure." 

UPCOMING BNAMERICAS EVENTS

4TH Mexico Electric Power Summit

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5TH Mexico Infrastructure Summit

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4TH Mexico Oil&Gas Summit

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