Industrial Internet Consortium: Another Industrial Internet of Things (IoT) Organization

Summary

By Bill Lydon, Editor

The Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC), recently founded by AT&T, Cisco, GE, IBM, and Intel, is another organization focused on the Internet of Things (IoT), big data, and the connected world. The goals of this group are to break down the barriers of technology silos to support better access to big data with improved integration of the physical and digital worlds. The Industrial Internet Consortium intends to take the lead in establishing interoperability across various industrial environments for a more connected world.

The Industrial Internet Consortium was formed as a group under the Object Management Group, a nonprofit trade association as defined in section 501(c)(6) of the US Internal Revenue Code. The Object Management Group (OMG) is an international, not-for-profit technology standards consortium founded in 1989. OMG’s modeling standards include Unified Modeling Language (UML) and Model Driven Architecture (MDA).

The group explains that the purpose of the Industrial Internet Consortium is to improve integration of the physical and digital worlds by identifying requirements for open interoperability standards and define common architectures to connect smart devices, machines, people, processes, and data. Membership levels of the consortium are defined by the following company annual sales and corresponding annual dues:

If you are interested in becoming a member, contact Ken Berk, Vice President of Business Development for OMG [email protected]

Board

There are 10 members on the IIC Steering Committee with the five founder seats, held by AT&T, Cisco, GE, IBM and Intel, being permanent as long as they remain in good standing. Dr. Richard Soley, the Executive Director and ex officio, holds the sixth seat. The remaining four board seats consist of two members from industry, one member from an SME or start-up, and one member from academia that will be filled by vote of the general membership within each respective level. Elected members have three-year terms.

The steering committee will function like a board, taking actions, establishing rules, and creating policies, and will create working groups for the purpose of:

• Considering research proposals and granting funding from government funds
• Prioritizing and developing requirements for standards to run through OMG (or other standards organizations)
• Making decisions on publications (white papers, etc.)

Requirements, Open Standards & Common Architectures

The IIC describes the need for this group’s existence: “As the digital and physical worlds collide, organizations need to easily connect and optimize assets and operations to drive agility across all industrial sectors.” The consortium was formed to help achieve this goal by identifying the requirements for open interoperability standards and defining common architectures to connect smart devices, machines, people, and processes that will help to accelerate more reliable access to big data and unlock business value. The IIC intends to take the lead in establishing interoperability across various industrial environments for a more connected world. The consortium’s charter includes encouraging innovation by:

• Utilizing existing and creating new industry use cases and test beds for real-world applications
• Delivering best practices, reference architectures, case studies, and standards requirements to ease deployment of connected technologies
• Influencing the global standards development process for internet and industrial systems
• Facilitating open forums to share and exchange real-world ideas, practices, lessons, and insights
• Building confidence around new and innovative approaches to security

On March 27, 2014, the IIC conducted a Web meeting to introduce the organization. The presenters during the meeting included:

• Mike Troiano, Vice President of Advanced Mobility Solutions, AT&T Business Solutions
• Tony Shakib, Vice President of Internet of Things Business Group,Cisco
• Bill Ruh, Vice President & Global Technology Director, GE
• Ron Ambrosio, Distinguished Engineer & CTO of Smarter Energy Research, IBM
• Ton Steenman, Vice President of IoT Solutions Group, Intel
• Dr. Richard Soley, Executive Director of Industrial Internet Consortium & Chairman and CEO of the Object Management Group

Working Committees

IIC Working Committees coordinate and establish the priorities and enable technologies of the industrial Internet to accelerate market adoption and drive down the barriers to entry. Working committees are comprised of IIC member company representatives. Member companies can assign an unlimited number of individuals to the working committees.  However, the committees follow the, "one vote, one company" rule.

Technology

The Technology Working Committee will define and develop common architectures by selecting from standards available to all, from open, neutral, international, consensus organizations and reviewing relevant technologies that comprise the ecosystems that will make the industrial internet work.

Architecture

The Architecture Working Committee is a sub-committee reporting to the Technology Working Committee. Details on its activities will be posted on the IIC website on an ongoing basis.

Security

The Security Working Committee will establish a security framework to be applied to every technology adopted by the IIC. The framework shall ensure sufficient cyber security and privacy for the various users of the industrial internet. The Security Working Group will also point to best practices and identify gaps.

Marketing

The Marketing Working Committee was created to position the IIC as a community that champions innovation in connected intelligent machines and processes.

Test Beds

The IIC is working to identity the first, most important industrial test bed applications. Test bed activities are described as the organization’s primary functions, and members are actively working on identifying and prioritizing test beds. In addition, the organization is developing recommendations and templates that members may use to propose and drive development of public-private initiatives and privately-funded test beds. These templates, guidelines, and use case scenarios will be posted on the IIC website and are available for download by members only.

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