on November 20, 2024 Digital Transformation has become one of the most popular buzzwords in the automation industry, often used to describe any digital improvements to industrial technology. But what really is Digital Transformation, and how can your organization achieve it? The definition of Digital Transformation from the ARC Advisory Group is “the transformation of industrial products, operations, value chains, and aftermarket services that are enabled through the augmentation of people and knowledge through the expanded use of sensors, data, and analytics.” In other words, it’s more than just a technological upgrade; it requires a cultural shift that encourages organizations to continually challenge the status quo, innovate, and get comfortable with the quickly changing automation landscape. Digital Transformation is essential for businesses aiming to compete in today’s technology-driven market because it significantly enhances efficiency and streamlines operations by reducing manual work through automation and making data more accessible. Traditionally, control systems were built with human machine interfaces (HMI) communicating directly with PLCs, proprietary supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) systems with middleware, a proprietary historian, and a limited number of licensed clients and tags. This limits your scalability and leads to higher expenses, more downtime, and a steeper learning curve when you finally upgrade your system. Digital Transformation empowers businesses to improve customer experiences by leveraging edge and cloud technologies, data analytics, and emerging technologies like AI, ML, and predictive maintenance, which allows you to offer personalized services that meet modern consumer expectations. It also facilitates data-driven decision-making, providing insights into your enterprise and giving you the ability to grow and adapt to changes in the future without proportional increases in costs. Digital Transformation also includes bridging the gap between OT and IT systems, which helps you improve interoperability, increase collaboration across various departments, break down data silos, and boost overall productivity. Ultimately, embracing Digital Transformation not only enhances operational efficiency and customer engagement but also positions your organization for sustainable growth and innovation in an increasingly digital world. Step 1: Setting A Vision And Goals For Your Digital Transformation Roadmap A very common obstacle to Digital Transformation is changing entrenched systems, such as proprietary software and siloed OT and IT environments. Digital Transformation is a continuous process, so to ensure it works, your OT and IT managers need to be on board with it. This often means a shift in your organization’s culture and vision. Another common obstacle is balancing accessibility and security. To achieve Digital Transformation, your enterprise will need access to OT data, and younger workers often prefer using mobile devices, so you need a robust OT system with strong security and connectivity to open-source IT protocols. Also, tools like two-factor authentication and single sign-on ensure that only authorized users can access critical data. To guarantee your vision encompasses the diverse perspectives and needs across your organization, you should involve members from across departments and look at competitors in your industry. This allows you to derive actionable and measurable goals that focus on areas like improving customer experience, data accessibility, or enhancing operational efficiency. Step 2: Parallel Integration With Existing Systems One of the biggest misconceptions about Digital Transformation is that you need to rip and replace legacy systems. Instead of replacing your legacy infrastructure, adding a modern automation system in parallel allows for a gradual transition while still maintaining current operations. Step 3: Leverage MQTT For Data Transmission And A Unified Namespace You will need a capable messaging protocol to send data from all of your devices and systems to one place. MQTT is a lightweight, bidirectional messaging protocol that allows devices to publish and subscribe to data in real time. Originally designed for the oil & gas industry to improve bandwidth usage, MQTT has now become a dominant protocol for the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) and for building UNS. MQTT is one of the most useful technologies for Digital Transformation because it can reduce your bandwidth consumption by up to 90 percent. It also decouples your devices from your applications and connects them to your infrastructure, reducing connection and downtime issues and pushing polling closer to your devices. Step 4: Implement Edge Computing If your system needs to control and communicate with remote sites, you will also need an edge platform that seamlessly integrates with your central system. The system should have as few limits as possible for adding tags and device connections so you can easily scale your data collection power by adding new PLCs and sensors to your equipment. Step 5: Add New Devices And Sensors While modernizing existing systems is important, it’s also essential to capture data from previously inaccessible areas. Step five involves integrating new devices and sensors to expand data-collection capabilities. This is particularly relevant in cases where older infrastructure lacks sufficient sensors or where you are manually collecting data. New IoT-enabled devices can be added to the infrastructure, enabling more granular monitoring and control. Devices like Opto 22 ’s groov RIO offer nearly infinite configurability, allowing businesses to monitor various parameters such as temperature, pressure, and equipment performance. With MQTT Sparkplug built into these devices, organizations can seamlessly integrate new data points into their architecture, further enriching their data ecosystem. Step 6: Leverage The Cloud For Scalability And Advanced Analytics The final step in this Digital Transformation roadmap is to take advantage of cloud computing. The cloud offers virtually unlimited storage and computational power, making it an ideal platform for running advanced analytics, machine learning models, and business intelligence tools. However, transitioning to the cloud can be a challenge, especially for organizations that are unfamiliar with cloud infrastructure. Create Your Enterprise Digital Transformation Roadmap And Unified Namespace With Ignition Digital Transformation doesn’t have to be overwhelming. The key to creating a Digital Transformation roadmap for manufacturing, food and beverage, or any other industry lies in adopting an open, flexible, and collaborative approach — one that bridges the gap between OT and IT and empowers teams with the data they need to thrive in today’s fast-paced industrial environment. By following this six-step roadmap for Digital Transformation and leveraging Inductive Automation’s open-source, web-based platform Ignition with Cirrus Link Solutions’ MQTT modules , you can create a UNS and streamline your Digital Transformation. Ignition is a platform for SCADA, HMI, MES, ERP, and IIoT that can be customized to match your processes on-premise, at the edge, or in the cloud. Also, Ignition offers a free trial, and it has unlimited tags, clients, connections, and designers, so you can scale infinitely and prepare your system for future innovations. Inductive Automation also provides free Ignition education through Inductive University , and it partners with a vast community of Digital Transformation experts from around the world that you can connect with through the Find an Integrator page or on the Ignition Forum . Tags / Inductive Automation All rights reserved