General Electric Co. (GE) has made no secret of its desire to become the ruler of what it calls the “Industrial Internet,” a concept that’s often described as the Internet of Things for big industry. But to do that, GE needs to refashion itself as one of the biggest players in IT, and no IT player is complete without a cloud to handle all of those applications and data.

Which is why GE formally announced Predix Cloud yesterday, a version of its Predix machine data analytics software that’s now available as a cloud-based service.

According to GE, Predix Cloud is the only cloud solution that’s designed specifically to handle industrial data across various industries. GE officials told Reuters that Predix Cloud is designed to manage, analyze and store machine data in real-time, using what it calls a “gated community model” that ensures cloud tenants deserve their place in the industrial ecosystem. The Predix Cloud is aimed at globally regulated industies such as aviation, healthcare, transportation and oil/gas utilities, GE added.

Hacker bait?

The idea of an “Industrial Internet”-specific cloud is great in theory, but as Wired.com points out, by targeting some of the highest value companies in the world, GE’s new cloud could well become an awfully tempting target for hackers. GE is aware of this, though, and has made security one of the top selling points of Predix Cloud, hence the gated community model.

This model essentially means GE reviews apps in isolation prior to deploying them in order to ensure minimal impact on other cloud-based apps and services that are already up and running. In addition, GE is baking in what it calls “software-defined mortar” to each layer of the cloud stack. Essentially, this means isolating each layer of an application in order to observe and limit exactly what each data layer can access. This should ensure better visibility for detecting and isolating any threats, and preventing any data loss, the company said.

The Industrial Internet marches on

The launch of Predix Cloud comes two years after GE made its first major foray into the Industrial Internet with the launch of its data analytics platform bearing the same name. That “cloud agnostic” platform was built in partnership with Amazon Web Services, Accenture LLP and EMC’s Pivotal Software, Inc., and is designed to provide a common architecture for industrial operators to link up smart machines, sensors and analytics.

GE has since fine-tuned its platform by adding more predictive capabilities aimed at the aviation, healthcare, rail and energy industrial. More recently the company gave itself another shot in the arm with last year’s acquisition of API Healthcare, a provider of real-time analytics services and employee management solutions for the healthcare industry.

GE says Predix Cloud should play nicely with other cloud fabrics – for example, it can tap into Pivotal’s Cloud Foundry platform-as-a-service to help develop and deploy applications. The service will be offered on a pay-as-you-go pricing model when it goes into general availability early next year.

SiliconANGLE founder John Furrier and Jeff Immelt host the 2013 Mind and Machines event in Chicago.

GE presented their #industrialcloud vision which included:

• Welcome and opening – Jeff Immelt, GE CEO
• Keynote: “Business productivity and the impact of the Industrial Internet” – Florian Zettelmeyer, director of the Center on Data Analytics at the Kellogg School of Management
• New Industrial Internet capabilities and partnerships – Bill Ruh, vice president of GE Software, will join by key industry partners to reveal the latest developments and capabilities of the Industrial Internet.
• Customer outcomes panel discussion with Apache, ComEd, St. Lukes, and United Airlines – convened by Jeff Immelt and John Furrier

Image credit: Sam van Vlerken via flickr.com