Richard Soley's On The Road Blog

Richard Soley's On the Road Blog

On Monday, April 24th at Hannover Messe, the Linux Foundation launched the EdgeX Foundry, an open source software project designed to help companies build a common open framework for Internet of Things (IoT) edge computing. The EdgeX framework addresses the problem of fragmentation of IoT infrastructure, component complexity and the lack of a common IoT solution framework that is slowing broad market acceptance and growth in IoT, an important focus of the standards work at the Object Management Group® (OMG®) and of course the testbed initiatives of the Industrial Internet Consortium® (IIC®).

OMG is delighted to participate in the launch of this important new open-source initiative because it will drive interoperability and spur digital transformation in the IoT space. The EdgeX project aligns with our legacy of distributed computing and middleware standards and our current efforts in semantics and IoT. Businesses will be able to choose from an ecosystem of best-in-class software, hardware and services providers rather than developing their own edge computing solutions.

Dell Technologies is supporting the EdgeX initiative by contributing its FUSE source code base consisting of more than a dozen microservices and over 125,000 lines of code. Dell sits on both the OMG Board and IIC Steering Committee.

Some of the impetus and standards for the EdgeX project are the result of the work of OMG members who have developed, promulgated and deployed middleware standards for more than a quarter century. The Data-Distribution Service™ and CORBA® standards transfer bits and bytes from place to place on huge and complex networks. These standards have been deployed in literally billions of systems today, from mobile phones to banking systems, air combat sensor and firing integration systems, to operating room systems.

Understanding the meaning of data moving around industrial networks is another part of the interoperability challenge. OMG members have focused on semantic meaning for more than 20 years, publishing standards to integrate semantics—like the Ontology Definition Metamodel™ and the related Model-Driven Message Interoperability™ standards.

The IoT needs more of these semantic standards because millions of industrial devices are now connecting and sharing their extensive data on huge networks of analytics engines, sensors, and actuators. OMG looks forward to helping to unite the IoT community with solutions like the EdgeX Foundry with its wide array of standards and commercial offerings at the IoT edge, enabling faster ROI for industrial organizations.

Richard Soley's On the Road Blog

Last month, I was invited by Dr. Said Tabet from Dell (a member of both the Object Management Group® (OMG®) Board of Directors and an Industrial Internet Consortium® (IIC®) Steering Committee member) to visit Dell's Cambridge office (oddly enough in the same exact building where Bill Hoffman, the President and COO of OMG and I met 35 or so years ago) to brief a senior executive from an automotive company about standards and testbeds at OMG and IIC. I also had a teleconference with two gentlemen at MIT who are running an "Industry 4.0" course, followed with a teleconference to plan the Global Conferences panel at CeBIT. A busy week, but for once near home!

In mid-March, I traveled to Berlin for several functions, including the annual Bosch ConnectedWorld conference, presided over by IIC Steering Committee member and old OMG friend Dirk Slama, to participate in a technical workshop managed by the Bundesministerium für Wirtschaft und Energie (German Economics and Energy Ministry) in preparation for the German G20 Presidency this year. The technical workshop in preparation for the G20 was fascinating. About 650 attendees from all 20 of the G20 countries, worked together to come to some compromise about what the G20 dispatches might say about the Industrial Internet and Industry 4.0 after the ministerial meetings next month. Fortunately, both the Industrial Internet Consortium and the Object Management Group were mentioned, and quite often too.  The whole world appears to be suddenly keen on testbeds to learn more about the industrial use of IoT and standards to provide interoperability, portability, security, and privacy.  I guess we were prescient!

I was also honored to help graduate a fresh batch of students from the ReDI School of Digital Integration. Old friend Claus Schaale of CISCO worked with others, including Dirk Slama and other talents from Microsoft, to train these talented engineers in the Internet of Things development.

ReDI helps integrate refugees in Germany (mostly from Syria and Iraq) by training them to develop software. I was privileged to help recognize their graduation from the program.

Hundreds of speakers at the CeBIT Global Conferences and photographs of all of them adorned Hannover Messe's Hall 8 south entrance. (Can you find me on the bottom?)

Then I returned to the United States for a long weekend—a day in Boston, then three days in Washington for the beginning of the OMG and IIC quarterly meetings in Reston. The quarterly meetings were very successful—something like 1200 attendees registered for the meetings and special events which were open to the public. I had to leave immediately after the OMG Board meeting on March 21st to travel to CeBIT in Hannover, Germany, where I sat on a couple panels (including one with Tanja Rückert, EVP LoB Digital Assets and IoT at SAP) and helped work the IIC stand. 

This month, I had an excellent few days in Singapore, where interest in all of OMG's brands—OMG, IIC, CISQ™ and CSCC™—is running high!  The trip started out with an early-morning appearance on CNBC's show The Rundown with Akiko Fujita.  The interview was focused on securing the Internet of Things, but there was a good discussion of standards and testbeds as well.  You can view a brief clip of the show at http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?video=3000605413

Inside look at the studio for the CNBC program, The Rundown

The main event of this trip was my third sojourn to one of the world's best shows on the Internet of Things, IoT Asia 2017. This event is going from strength to strength, with excellent speakers and a fascinating set of exhibitors including not only large IoT vendors, but small and medium-sized enterprises, startups and regional pavilions (quite noticeably both Singapore and France). Interest in IIC testbeds and the status of OMG standards was quite high.

(l): Rama Ramakrishna, Salesforce; Vivek Kumar, Geometric Ltd.; Wouter Van Wersch, GE ASEAN; Charles Reed Anderson, Founder, Charles Reed Anderson & Associates; Swaroop Balakrishnan, Bosch Software Innovations GmbH and myself at IoT Asia 2017

As I was in town anyway, I met with government-owned firms and agencies and participated in a workshop organized by International Enterprise Singapore entitled Digitalisation of Manufacturing. Interest in all of our activities is riding high.

This week, I’m in Santiago meeting with government, academic, and mining institutions. Soon I’m off to return to Hannover, Germany for Hannover Messe, the world’s leading industrial show, the week of April 24^th.  I'm sure I'll have more to say then!