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50 SMT Magazine • November 2015 tunity across multiple industries, driving tan- gible value as data from these smart machines evolves into contextualized information. So far, companies are reporting that decision makers across the entire enterprise are gaining greater visibility into their operations which, in turn, allows them to respond to market and business challenges faster, with new opportunities to in- novate and drive out inefficiencies in their pro- cesses. We tend to talk about IoT with five ma- jor areas of enabling technologies: smart things (connecting more equipment to networks); data analytics (turning data into actionable in- formation); scalable computing/cloud (leverag- ing scalable computing, including off-premise resources); mobility (developing a smarter and more productive workforce); and security (sim- ply put, making sure everything is secure). Las Marias: What will be the advantages and disadvantages here? Hannah: The value at stake includes: (1) maximizing asset utilization—reducing selling, general, and administrative expenses and cost of goods sold by improving business-process execution and capital efficacy; (2) increasing employee productivity—enhancing labor re- sourcefulness that results in fewer or more pro- ductive man hours; (3) managing more effec- tively supply chain and logistics—eliminating waste and improving processes; (4) enriching the customer experience—increasing customer- lifetime value and growing market share by add- ing more buyers; and (5) fostering innovation— increasing the return on research and develop- ment investments, shortening time to market, and creating additional revenue streams from new business models and opportunities. Las Marias: how can manufacturers collect the correct, accurate data from their manufac- turing lines to be able to derive actionable intel- ligence that will help decision makers formulate business strategies for the whole company? Hannah: To successfully achieve much of the value at stake, manufacturers have to converge the plant-floor operations technol- ogy (OT) and the company-wide information technology (IT). Operations technology is the world of industrial equipment, which includes devices, controllers, sensors and actuators. In- formation technology is the platform for end- to-end business processes, including ERP and CRM systems, supply-chain management, lo- gistics and HR. It is important to establish a cross-functional team that agrees that this con- vergence is necessary, so they can align goals between the two organizations and focus on people, processes and technology. Everybody needs to work differently and practices have to change to optimize the workflow. People have to evaluate what intelligence is needed from which units, while clearly defining how it will help enhance the process. Next, they must col- lect the data, organize it to enrich identified business processes, and then contextualize it to make it actionable for the user. Finally, correla- tion and qualitative analysis of the information has to take place, so processes can be improved and people can work more efficiently. This is what Rockwell Automation calls the Connected Enterprise, which is boosting the advantages of smart, safe, secure and sustain- CoNNeCTING THe eNTerPrISe FeaTure INTervIeW Mike Hannah, market development, rockwell automation.