Startup Litmus Automation Inc. today announced that it has closed a $30 million funding round led by Belden Inc., a publicly traded maker of industrial equipment.

Litmus will use the Series B round to expand the adoption of its namesake industrial “internet of things” platform. Additionally, the startup plans to partner with Belden on a joint go-to-market initiative.

Companies such as manufacturers collect technical information about the equipment at their facilities to find potential malfunctions. Data collected from industrial equipment is also useful for finding opportunities to increase operational efficiency. San Jose, California-based Litmus provides a cloud platform that makes it easier for companies in the industrial sector to turn their data into useful insights.

Companies historically had to implement custom software workflows to collect technical information from their industrial equipment. In a factory with dozens or hundreds of different machines, the task can involve a significant amount of work. To save time for developers, Litmus’ platform provides connectors that it says can collect data from more than 250 types of systems without the need for custom code. 

Different types of industrial equipment often organize the data they generate in different formats, which complicates analysis. Litmus has equipped its platform with a tool that organizes data points from different systems in a single, standardized format to simplify processing. That information can then be made available to a company’s internal applications through an application programming interface and software development kits provided by Litmus. 

Litmus says its platform lends itself to multiple analytics use cases. According to the startup, companies can use equipment data collected by its platform to create real-time dashboards that track important developments such as potential hardware failures. Litmus also makes it possible to send data to a company’s machine learning applications for analysis.

“We’ve always been a product-led company, and this investment proves that the product we’ve developed is leading the market in solving OT complexity to capture the data needed to power advanced Industry 4.0 use cases,” said Litmus co-founder and Chief Executive Officer Vatsal Shah.

Data management is not the only task that the startup promises to simplify for customers. Litmus’ platform includes tools that make it possible to remotely change the configuration of connected devices, monitor their performance and download firmware updates. 

Another built-in tool enables companies to package applications into software containers and deploy them to edge computing hardware. A manufacturer, for example, might deploy applications to edge computing appliances deployed at its factories. Running software on-premises at a location such as a factory removes the need to send data to a remote cloud environment for processing, which lowers latency and reduces bandwidth costs.  

Litmus will use its latest funding round to expand adoption of its platform in international markets. As part of the effort, the startup plans to invest in partnerships with industrial hardware makers such as Belden. The startup also plans to grow its sales, marketing and customer support teams.

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