By Jason Andersen, VP of business line management, Stratus
Software as a Service (SaaS) and Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) delivery models are already widely used in enterprise data centers today, but with the rise of the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) and increased device connectivity, the trend is now emerging among industrial manufacturing organizations as well. Yet even as the anything-as-a-service (XaaS) model for operational computing gains popularity, many manufacturers are hesitant to make the move.
The future of industrial automation will be driven by those who are willing to adopt new operational models like XaaS. Even for the most risk-averse organizations, there are ways to complement existing technologies as you build the required infrastructure and skills to be successful in the long run. In fact, given the potential value XaaS holds to provide actionable insight, operational technology (OT) professionals would be wise to prioritize preparing their organization for these deployments so they can take advantage of the benefits before their competitors beat them to it.
There will be some challenges along the way. XaaS likely makes sense for your organization – but only after you have developed the right plan. Those organizations considering XaaS have some important questions to consider before moving forward:
Where can you start deploying XaaS today?
The place where we are seeing the most deployment is around analytics solutions. And this makes sense since, until recently and even today, many of these manufacturing sites or other edge sites (such as farms or oil pipelines) have been data islands. However, the extraction and assessment of this data can be used to justify the connectivity and security investment. There are, of course, other uses of XaaS that come into play like predictive maintenance but most of those also start with data and analytics at their core.
Are you ready for the ongoing investment XaaS requires?
Fortunately, many of these XaaS solutions are easy to get started. But without a very good holistic view of your end point, you may not get a good return. For instance, maximizing the benefits of data collected at the operational edge and sent to the cloud for analysis requires a more specialized skillset. Additionally, XaaS solutions are services where you are charged for the usage as you go and grow. This is very different than most automation technologies which have a high up front cost but extremely long life cycles.
Lastly, you must consider the data performance (or latency) required to drive the applications. Many manufacturing XaaS projects have failed due to this and it’s the reason that there are new edge computing solutions coming to market now. The XaaS investment is likely a combination of upgraded OT infrastructure and XaaS services. To fully prepare, make sure you understand the full picture of what investing in XaaS means for upgrading your OT infrastructure and recruit the right professionals.
Is your OT infrastructure equipped for secure connectivity?
Take stock of your current OT infrastructure to begin mapping out your path to XaaS deployments. You may not be ready. Data centers have evolved over the past decade to handle SaaS offerings with established connectivity and robust security, OT is still struggling to get there. These organizations often must upgrade their network infrastructure to ensure a secure, high-performance connection to XaaS services. And again, a cloud-based solution may not be enough based upon your local needs.
How should you balance your XaaS deployment to minimize cost?
The best advice is to start in a pragmatic way. Prioritize applications with lower support requirements while keeping applications with more complex requirements on-premise. This will allow you to test the solution and all of its impacts without interrupting critical processes. Further, this approach may allow you to avoid surprises such as the costs related to data storage. This also opens the door for you to better understand your edge infrastructure needs in terms of reliability, simplicity and security.
Think of XaaS as another tool in your belt. Consider your options carefully and you may find it best to pursue a hybrid model where some computing takes place in the cloud and some at the edge. This is not an “either/or” choice — go with a mix that fits your organizational needs best.
About the Author
Jason Andersen is Vice President of Business Line Management and is responsible for setting the product roadmaps and go to market strategies for Stratus Products and Services. Prior to joining Stratus in 2013, Jason was Director of Product Line Management at Red Hat. In this role, he was responsible for the go to market strategy, product introductions and launches, as well as product marketing for the JBoss Application Products. Jason also previously held Product Management positions at Red Hat and IBM Software Group.
