AT&T Mobility, GE: Industrial Internet

Meredith Powers, M2M, manufacturing and healthcare, advanced mobility solutions marketing; and Mike Waitley, M2M Center of Excellence, explained how AT&T and GE are working together to advance the Industrial Internet.

By Mark Hoske February 12, 2014

AT&T and GE are working together to advance the Industrial Internet, according to Meredith Powers, AT&T M2M, manufacturing and healthcare, advanced mobility solutions marketing, and Mike Waitley, AT&T M2M Center of Excellence. Here are some notes based on their presentation at the 2014 ARC Forum new product press conference:

  • AT&T’s MobileWorld Congress is in a few weeks and will generate many announcements related to mobility across many industries.
  • Via video, Chris Hill, senior vice president, advanced solutions AT&T, discussed transparency across network connection so customers don’t have to deal with various carriers across facilities. GE Predix platform (software platform for the Industrial Internet) – provides machine to machine (M2M) connections. Self-regulation of machines will increase profits and value. Embedded security is needed to ensure network is secure and reliable. Many more machines will be online over time. 
  • Power said the world is moving to connected products: industrial, security, surveillance.
  • Manufacturing, healthcare, transportation, construction, and energy are the top-five industries using M2M.
  • Waitley, who oversees the industrial vertical, said AT&T wants best-in-class coverage and best-in-class service management platform with real-time provisioning, advanced global diagnostics and device monitoring, automated alerting and response tools, and powerful reporting tools.
  • Asset management provides productivity in the dark. AT&T Foundry centers help improve speed to market and collaboration with the best customers, suppliers, and innovators, in a lab-like environment. There are four such centers, each with a different focus, including one for M2M communications.
  • Before sending a ton of data out from a machine or process, look at how and when data is transferred and in what form. If the machine is smarter, then it can make decisions about when information is transferred. Data hasn’t been used much for product management.
  • Most manufacturers are doing M2M something. We’re adding capabilities to give data back to understand how machines are performing, outside the four walls. Original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) want to know when machines are getting out of spec. OEMs generally are having trouble accessing their machines’ installed in their customers’ facilities. A provisioning platform can give them visibility.
  • In a press release handed out at the meeting, AT&T and GE signed a global alliance to allow GE machines to connect to the AT&T network and cloud, creating what it calls the first highly-secure wireless communications system for GE’s Industrial Internet

Return to the ARC product press conference summary.

– Mark T. Hoske and Jordan M. Schultz, content managers CFE Media, Control Engineering, and Plant Engineering, mhoske@cfemedia.com, jschultz@cfemedia.com.