What is the “internet of things”? It really involves bringing together two different departments: information technology, or the people controlling servers and software, and operational technology, the people running machines and equipment. By funneling OT data to IT analytics, insights such as predictive maintenance and self-healing supply chains become possible. McKinsey researchers anticipate up to $11 billion in economic value created by freeing up machine data for analytics by 2025. Better yet, IoT will likely save businesses $1 trillion annually thanks to proactive maintenance practices by 2022.

“I think it’s an interesting dichotomy to see, and I think IT folks are also starting to get excited because finally, this dirty, dusty data is becoming accessible to them [through our PI system],” said Penny Gunterman (pictured, left), product marketing manager at OSIsoft.

Gunterman and  Chris Nelson (pictured, right), vice president of engineering at OSIsoft, spoke with Jeff Frick (@JeffFrick), host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s mobile livestreaming studio, during the PI World event in San Francisco. They discussed the convergence of IT and OT and how the two practices are influencing modern data management. (* Disclosure below.)

Dusty data becomes accessible

Currently, much of OT data is dark, hidden away across internal firewalls in facilities often isolated by razor wires and security gates. OSIsoft is working to bridge this gap. A data management and analytics company, it has worked with the Heineken Co., Amgen Inc. and The Hershey Co. to extract meaning from OT data.

“We believe the PI System, once you install it, brings value to those customers, and then you can overlay projects and really drive the value up over time,” Nelson said. “We focus on moving the data and marry that with our customers’ creativity to use that data for things we never even thought they could do. So it’s this infrastructure approach where we take care of the data flow and then marry our customers on top of that where they just light up that creativity.”

After 30 years collecting data, OSIsoft is determined to see further growth. “I think the important part of the outcomes is we’re really reducing a lot of the resources that are scarce in the world. You know, water, power, carbon footprint. [These] are the outcomes that … people are trying to reduce with the data, and it’s really impactful in the world today,” Nelson concluded.

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of the PI World US 2018 event. (* Disclosure: TheCUBE is a paid media partner for PI World. Neither OSIsoft LLC, the event sponsor, nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: SiliconANGLE