At the International Manufacturing Technology Show, Google Cloud announced an update to its Manufacturing Data Engine (MDE) designed to bridge the gap between operational technology (OT) and information technology (IT) in manufacturing. This update aims to empower manufacturers to achieve greater productivity, innovation, and profitability.
The key update is integrating MDE with Cortex Framework, a packaged solution of reference architectures, deployment accelerators, and integrated services designed to speed up cloud deployments. This integration will provide manufacturers with a holistic view of their operations, from the factory floor to business processes, through AI-enabled analytics and insights.
Historically, manufacturers have faced a disconnect between their physical machines (OT) and the data they generate (IT). This separation has led to siloed teams and inefficiencies. Integrating MDE with Cortex Framework allows manufacturers to leverage both OT and IT data to:
* **Link enterprise insights to factory floor insights:** By contextualizing shop floor data with enterprise data sources (e.g., production, supply chain, customer service, marketing), businesses can gain comprehensive insights to improve their operations.
* **Gain end-to-end process insights:** Connecting sales orders to production orders, overall equipment effectiveness, and purchase orders provides a holistic view of workflows.
* **Drive accurate and timely overall equipment effectiveness analytics:** Businesses can monitor and optimize equipment and plant performance, availability, and quality at scale, taking action to improve production.
* **Operate more sustainably:** Analyzing telemetry data for utility consumption and waste can help reduce costs and meet sustainability goals.
* **Innovate with AI on top:** Businesses can leverage machine learning models to detect anomalies in machine data, improve predictive maintenance, and monitor product quality in a flexible and scalable manner.
In short, Google Cloud's MDE update is a significant step towards empowering manufacturers to leverage data and AI to achieve operational excellence and enhance their competitiveness.
