Presentation given at Thingmonk 2016 (13th September) on the importance of the edge of network in the Internet of Things in the context of industrial and manufacturing.

1. Living life on the
edge.
Martin Gale
Master Inventor and CTO for Industrial Sector, IBM
UK and Ireland
@martinjgale

2. In the beginning, we did things the hard way.
Most expensiveLeast expensive

3. Connected sensors moved the boundaries of enterprise
systems and “the edge” became a thing.
Remote sites Headquarters
e.g. MQTT
Edge of the network

4. There are some important factors we learned from this.
Impact on
enterprise systems
design and
capacity
The cost of remote
communications
Latency between
sense and
respond.
Good old
fashioned common
sense.

5. Capable devices, capable edge.
HeadquartersRemote sites
e.g. MQTT
Shift towards actionable insight.
More efficient use of comms.
Autonomy of remote sites.
More possibilities.

6. What we do at the edge varies in complexity.
Complexity
Filtering/
aggregation
Media
analytics
Computepower
Stream
analytics
Data
mediation
and flow
control
Application/
device
integration

7. Very few IoT reference architectures break the edge down.
Control Code
Local
applications
Analytics
Models
Sensor SDKs Back-end SDK
Application Runtime
Wide Area Network
Local Area Network
Assets
Sensors and
Actuators
LocalMonitoringand
Management
RemoteMonitoringand
Management
PhysicalSecurity
DevicePlatform
Security
Device
Device installation and maintenance
Device and asset management
Technology
Organisational
Who can access the
running box?
How?
Who installs and fixes
the device?
How do we apply
fixes remotely?
What do we build
our applications
out of?
What type of device
is really needed?

8. The edge applies to multiple areas of “Industry 4.0”.
Flexible manufacturing
Internet of People and Things
Autonomous systems
Analytics and cognitive
Internet of services

9. In manufacturing, halted production costs big money.
Many manufacturers only know when production will halt
when it happens!
per minute
£10ks 5-10
minutes a day

10. Incremental use of the edge helps reduce risk of lost production.
Spot the trend and
automatically
respond
Understand the trend
and its context

11. A hybrid of analytics on the cloud and edge enable a
smarter factory.
sound, vibration,
temperature
Synthesis of readings
indicates head will break
within 24 hours
Triggers creation of work
order for that night’s planned
maintenance window
Re-routes high
priority work order
to another cell in
the meantime

12. Thank you!