Innovation after the end of history: Why industrial intelligence is key to success in our connected future

Written by Caspar Herzberg, Chief Executive Officer, AVEVA

Around the world, industries and economies are at an inflection point. As industries weather the pressures of inflation and stagnation, supply chain disruptions, and generational transitions in the workforce, they’re seeing change accelerate faster than at any point in the past 50 years. Disruption is now a familiar aspect of business, and enterprises must evolve through rapid, repeated cycles of adaptation.

We might expect these pressures to fracture economies, and to an extent, they do. Yet, amid constant change, leading companies are exploring opportunities to succeed with deeper collaboration and data sharing. Some enterprises have realized that by taking a data-centric approach to commercial insight, they can gain agility, ensure operational sustainability and build economic resilience. This realization—coupled with the understanding that data is the one commodity that grows in value the more you share and use it—will transform business models. We are at the dawn of a new industrial era: welcome to the connected future.

Sharing data can transform our world

To overcome challenges, industries are building stronger bonds throughout their value chains. At AVEVA, we see deeper collaboration between partners drive the agility, efficiency, resilience and sustainability that industries need to survive.

A great example is Australia’s AGL, which has taken a data-centric approach to managing the hundreds of wind turbines that now make up its power grid. By combining operational data with information on weather, demand and performance, AGL can ensure that each turbine is working in the most efficient way possible to deliver the most energy.

AGL is just one example. Industries from food and energy to pharmaceuticals and power are exploring how they can build intelligent, connected networks that combine data across their value chains and life cycles, as well as remove silos with trusted applications. As the differences between engineering, operations and IT fall away, enterprises can empower their teams to make accurate decisions quickly. With integrated intelligence, companies can determine the best paths forward for more secure, lower-carbon energy, safe and trusted foods, or the macroeconomic shifts required to tackle climate change.

We call this evolution the connected industrial economy.

Harnessing the opportunity of data-driven collaboration

Some 89% of industrial companies in 2022 cited data management and data visualization as key to their success in the new economy. It’s also proven that well-managed industrial information drives efficiency and sustainability. Gartner estimates that companies that manage and share data efficiently drive approximately three times greater efficiency gains than companies that don’t. Most companies have too much data, and they struggle to control it. By unifying data into a digital backbone and visualizing it, AVEVA empowers industrial teams to identify more efficient ways of working and to drive sustainability. We call this industrial intelligence-as-a-service. We think it’s the key to building a sustainable economy and driving resilient growth.

One example is Dominion Energy, a US-based power company, that has developed a new revenue stream by sharing real-time data about renewable power generation with its customers. This data sharing has created a new source of income for Dominion because its customers now use the power data to validate ESG its commitments.

At AVEVA, we see it as our mission to help enterprises thrive in this new world. We are pleased to be working with many innovative companies, leveraging the power of integrated data in the digital twin to drive efficiency, productivity and sustainability.

This is just the beginning. The data twin that we see today will become the foundation of a broader digital twin that encompasses all of the integrated data in a company—the energy twin, the sensor twin, and even, in time, the carbon twin. These datasets come together to enable teams to collaborate better through visualization and insight.

We believe this approach to industrial intelligence will transform how industries operate.

Connect with your future. Unlock your world.

At AVEVA, we believe there are three critical elements to thrive in this new connected industrial economy.

First, you need an open, agnostic industrial digital backbone so that you can break down silos between teams and seamlessly connect industrial ecosystems—even beyond an individual enterprise​.

Second, you need innovative, AI-enriched applications spanning the industrial life cycle. With end-to-end insights, you can empower your connected workers to optimize the design-build-operate-optimize cycle as well as your complete value chain.

On top of this, you need to layer an intuitive, responsive experience that makes it easy for teams to collaborate, experiment, and innovate while reducing cost and risk and driving sustainability.