A couple of news items came my way about industrial software companies leveraging major cloud services to develop their platforms. I wonder when Amazon (Amazon Web Services or AWS), Microsoft (Azure), Google (Cloud), Oracle, or others will be the main industrial software sources. This news concerns Koch Industries (Koch Engineered Solutions / OnPoint Digital) and Retrospect
Koch Industries’ OnPoint Digital Solutions and AWS Collaborate to Co-Develop Industrial Engineering Platform
OnPoint Digital Solutions, a subsidiary of Koch Engineered Solutions LLC (KES), announced today a collaboration with Amazon Web Services, Inc. (AWS), an Amazon.com company and Koch’s preferred cloud provider, to co-develop an intelligent process optimization platform (IPOP). The platform – designed to enable OnPoint’s solutions – will utilize cloud and edge digital infrastructure to provide advanced machine learning and industrial computing capabilities for OnPoint’s connected ecosystem, enabling industrial operators and their preferred partners to integrate and act upon the best available knowledge anywhere, anytime, at scale.
Manufacturers worldwide are modifying operations to address the Industry 4.0 revolution and the associated infrastructure necessary to integrate smart technologies. This unique collaboration between OnPoint and AWS will leverage and complement AWS’s generally available infrastructure services, IoT, advanced analytics and machine learning. Together, the co-developed technology will help connect industrial companies with the solutions they need to optimize their operations in a variety of industrial verticals from oil and gas to food and beverage, electronics, smart grid, paper manufacturing, steel production and more.
“The Fourth Industrial Revolution is upon us, and in the same way that we are teaming up with AWS to co-develop this software platform, we believe the platform will enrich our partnerships with KES customers through the digital application of our world-class capabilities,” said Dave Dotson, President of KES. “This collaboration with AWS seeks to transform the way KES partners with industrial operations, removing barriers and leveraging technology that connects operators directly with subject matter expertise to get more value from their data and make better, more efficient decisions in real-time. We’re working with a sense of greater purpose toward improved connected solutions across industries that will create value for our customers and society.”
As a part of Koch Industries, OnPoint has access to decades of process industry experience in engineering, manufacturing, and operations through companies such as Flint Hills Resources, Koch Ag & Energy Solutions, Georgia-Pacific, Molex, Guardian, and INVISTA. OnPoint is now delivering connected solutions using the strong expertise that resides in Koch Engineered Solutions brands such as John Zink Hamworthy Combustion, Koch-Glitsch, Koch Heat Transfer, Sentient Energy, and Koch Separation Solutions. Available today, Ember™, “your digital combustion assistant,” is the first solution in the OnPoint IPOP platform, enabling operators to leverage KES’s domain expertise to advance their industrial processes in the refining and petrochemical markets. Ember delivers real-time insights that enable facilities to optimize their combustion processes leading to a safer and more efficient operation. Improving visibility and providing intelligent recommendations in real time enables simultaneous improvements of emissions, safety, throughput, reliability and efficiency.
The IPOP solution will also provide “state of the asset” information to equipment manufacturers to enable them to be proactive in both decisions and customer support. Leveraging first principle physics models combined with machine learning technology, solutions built on IPOP will be designed to provide better insights and recommendations to plant operator customers, to proactively optimize industrial processes and provide predictive maintenance, quality, and yield analyses.
“From engineering to manufacturing, Koch brings invaluable knowledge and full lifecycle capabilities in asset design, implementation, operations, and maintenance,” said Sarah Cooper, GM of Outcome Driven Engineering at AWS. “At the heart of our industrial processing customers’ operations are the physics-based first principle models that largely haven’t changed for the past two decades. The IPOP collaboration with KES brings new emerging digital services to help accelerate process innovation and improve resource efficiency and product quality.”
To get started with Ember today or to learn more about this co-development and our products, please contact us at [email protected] [email protected]or visit the OnPoint website at OnPointSolutions.com https://www.onpointsolutions.com/.
Retrospect Announces Integration with Microsoft Azure Blob Storage
Retrospect, a StorCentric company, today announced the general availability of Microsoft Azure Blob Storage support for Retrospect Backup and Retrospect Virtual. The software updates allow businesses to leverage Azure as a backup destination as well as a cloud storage location to protect on-premise data. Included in the release is support for ransomware protection using Retrospect’s Immutable Backup, preventing malware from compromising critical business backups. With deep Azure integration, Retrospect Backup continues to provide the industry’s most flexible backup solution with simple, safe, and secure backups.
Microsoft Azure has grown dramatically recently, and with its addition to the wide range of cloud storage providers that Retrospect supports, customers can select the best cloud based on their unique business. Retrospect Backup is able to use Azure as a storage destination as well as a data source, enabling companies to protect assets stored on Blob Storage using Retrospect’s workflow options.
“By integrating Microsoft Azure Blob Storage into Retrospect, IT administrators now have the ability to utilize their organization’s existing Microsoft Azure account for offsite backups that can be locked down for a specific retention period to protect against ransomware or other digital attacks,” said JG Heithcock, General Manager, Retrospect, a StorCentric Company. “Retrospect’s unique policy-based backup and broad set of features, with granular filtering and out-of-band backup transfers, allow companies to have a point-in-time restore for their data, protected by Microsoft Azure in addition to Amazon S3 and Google Cloud Storage, among others.”
