Beyond SCADA: Consolidating Your OT With an IIoT Platform

Industrial enterprises use SCADA as a process control system to monitor data acquisition processes and oversee various related workflows. The data coming from OT devices is taken in by SCADA systems and integrated into the SCADA ecosystem as applications covering a range of use cases for the shop floor. So why does an industrial IoT platform still make sense here? 

One downside of SCADA is that these systems are not made for rapid scaling. They do not accommodate change so easily. Most of the time, the processes are slow and inflexible. Further, the data collection processes, though robust, have their limitations. They are usually only suited for monitoring, supervision, and sending out alerts at best. More sophisticated analytics or use cases based on machine learning are out of reach. 

The Internet of Things Powers Digital Transformation in Factories

Raw materials and energy have been the foundations of every manufactured product since the industrial revolution. With Industry 4.0, data is becoming more important than ever before, not only to minimize operational costs and increase efficiencies but to wring every bit of product and profit from raw materials and energy.

Decades ago, factories pioneered the Internet of Things (IoT) with the use of technologies such as supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) and programmable logic controllers (PLC). Valuable as they were, and still are, those traditional IoT applications are mainly about controlling robots and other equipment, monitoring production, and identifying problems such as overheating pumps.