It’s been a couple of weeks, however I’m nonetheless fascinated with the thrill popping out of Cisco Reside U.S. in June. We hosted our second annual Cisco Reside U.S. Industrial IoT Summit and had our largest attendance thus far. Leaders from throughout the manufacturing, utilities and transportation industries got here collectively to share data, talk about expertise traits and challenges, and join with one another in business breakout periods.
Discussions have been eye opening, and we heard straight from clients throughout the Industrial IoT area about their top-of-mind priorities. Many advised me how helpful it was to have interaction in high-level dialogue with their friends: merely figuring out they don’t seem to be alone and face related challenges was a consolation.
Insights from the Industrial IoT Summit
Cybersecurity stays a prime precedence. In a pre-event survey, leaders throughout all verticals advised us that, like final 12 months, cybersecurity stays their prime precedence. As methods grow to be extra built-in and related and assault surfaces enhance, organizations are in search of methods to achieve OT community visibility, guarantee safe distant entry, and phase their operational networks. I talked to a number of clients who additionally hope to automate safety enforcement or add zero-trust capabilities throughout their industrial networks, which underscores the significance of designing a safe community structure from the bottom up.
The workforce abilities hole is a significant concern. Throughout the Industrial IoT panorama, clients are discovering it troublesome to rent and retain the fitting expertise who understands each OT and IT environments and may drive collaboration between the 2. Many requested about how we will leverage expertise and automation to assist. Upskilling and investing in workforce improvement is essential, and we heard straight from a college accomplice about how they’re bridging IT/OT via a partnership with Cisco Networking Academy to coach college students in new IT/OT abilities and assist businesses rent and nurture expertise.
Networks have to be modernized to arrange for the longer term. After all, there was quite a lot of power and dialogue round how AI is driving innovation and optimization throughout Industrial IoT. Digitization is growing throughout all business verticals, and virtualization of key expertise elements is now a actuality. Mobility was additionally top-of-mind as extra industries look to deploy wi-fi applied sciences as a part of modernizing their networks. The dialogue additionally targeted on how growing safe and resilient entry to information in industrial edge gadgets, property and functions is essential.
Every of our breakout summit discussions supplied significant takeaways as nicely. Learn on for extra insights from the totally different Industries!
Manufacturing Breakout: Key Takeaways
Dependable wi-fi connectivity is essential for productiveness. Main producers want reliable, at all times “on,” lossless wi-fi applied sciences, and demand is simply rising. Dependable connectivity with Wi-Fi stays a problem, however our Industrial Wi-fi Options with Extremely-Dependable Wi-fi Backhaul are enabling clients to assist use circumstances round cell gadgets and autonomous autos like AGVs that require dependable low-latency and zero-packet loss connectivity, regardless of obstacles and RF interference.
Good manufacturing improvements require an equally sensible community. As factories modernize, maintaining a safe, resilient community can imply the distinction between a traditional day or a catastrophic shutdown costing a producer hundreds of thousands of {dollars}. A scalable, versatile, safe, and deterministic community is important for improvements like {hardware} useful resource virtualization, zero-trust safety, and AI-enabled manufacturing functions.
We heard from one main producer about how Cisco’s structure is enabling secure, dependable information assortment to assist them develop AI and ML fashions that make suggestions to optimize manufacturing, drive course of management, assist preventative upkeep, and allow data-driven manufacturing. We additionally heard from an EV battery manufacturing buyer who makes use of AI and ML to provide one of many greenest, most sustainable EV batteries on the planet at a 70% discount in carbon per battery made in comparison with its opponents.
Utilities Breakout: Key Takeaways
There’s a main shift occurring towards grid modernization. Power demand is rising, and utilities organizations have to combine sustainability practices at scale whereas additionally enhancing safety, effectivity and reliability. To satisfy these wants, modernizing the facility grid and the distributed structure they depend upon is vital.
Grid resiliency and safety is essential. Clients advised us they really feel an urgency to speed up cybersecurity measures to maintain essential energy infrastructures secure, present entry for applied sciences like 5G and eSIMs, and discover scalable community administration and automation instruments to reduce downtime and drive effectivity. Utilities corporations face challenges within the administration of backhaul communications and need assistance streamlining these operations. We additionally mentioned how the battle in Ukraine has highlighted the significance of essential infrastructure grid resiliency in essentially the most opposed of situations.
We talked concerning the potential for SD-WAN with Cisco Catalyst Industrial Routers to safe and scale grid infrastructure with complete firewalls, particularly given the quickly evolving menace panorama and growing sophistication of assaults. SD-WAN provides an answer for zero-touch provisioning and the flexibility to standardize safety insurance policies throughout all routers within the discipline, which minimizes the potential for human error and configuration points.
Transportation Breakout: Key Takeaways
Transportation community modernization is important. As billions of residents and tons of cargo are moved each day to assist the fashionable economic system, expertise drives the essential infrastructure that helps it; but the transportation vertical has one among largest expertise money owed throughout Industrial IoT. Many of those methods are funded by the general public, nonetheless; and budgets are tight. Businesses really feel an urgency to simplify, modernize and obtain a greater digital footprint at scale, however they need to make sensible funding choices and select the fitting networking infrastructure that’s safe, scalable, and simplified.
Cybersecurity is at a essential level and is rising to the C-Suite. OT visibility and entry stay main challenges throughout the transportation sector as DOTs, cities and international locations modernize their networks with Clever Transportation Techniques (ITS). I heard from clients that they’re trying to make the fitting investments amid elevated cyberattack surfaces, exterior regulatory pressures, and cybersecurity mandates like CISA and Europe’s NIS2.
AI will remodel how cities, railroads, airports, and DOTs work together with the inhabitants. We heard from a public transportation buyer who shared among the ways in which AI will allow them to boost citizen security by predicting site visitors patterns, lowering journey instances, growing automation, and interesting in predictive upkeep to stop main accidents like prepare derailments. However to reap these advantages, organizations have to spend money on safe, well-managed networks that may finally deal with an enormous quantity of knowledge throughout the sting, core, and cloud to drive AI and ML.
Adopting SD-WAN dramatically will increase effectivity and safety. Conventional IT environments have embraced SD-WAN for years to scale back entry prices, enhance reliability, scale back difficulty decision time, and acquire richer visibility into WAN operations. Now, a few of our OT clients are adopting Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN. We heard from a rail buyer who depends on Cisco Catalyst SD-WAN as an answer for his or her operational areas to energy evolving connectivity wants, enhance visibility, lower your expenses, and enhance automation. They shared how embracing SD-WAN has made it simpler to handle mission-critical site visitors and phase their networks whereas additionally driving higher IT and OT collaboration throughout its operations.
Our clients are our companions. Bringing collectively business leaders to collaborate and dive into the challenges and improvements shaping the way forward for Industrial IoT was such a implausible expertise, and the summit’s discussions underscored the urgency of adopting superior applied sciences to guard and join our clients throughout all Industrial IoT sectors. As industries attempt to modernize their networks and put together for a extra related and data-driven future, we all know we might not be capable of present options with out the belief of our clients. Collectively, we’ll make progress and securely make the longer term a actuality!
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