Connecticut-based General Electric (GE) that provides capital, expertise and infrastructure has sealed a deal and signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Chinese telecommunication provider, Huawei. The of shake hands aims to developing applications for Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) and driving more “Industrial Internet” business into China.
These cloud-based applications as a part of the partnership, will be powered by GE’s Predix IIoT platform which it claims, is used by China Eastern Airlines, China Telecom and Tianjin city’s street lamps grid. The Joint offering however will see the combination of Huawei’s IoT gateways, big data computing platform, network controllers, and connection management platform.
Reportedly, it will connect machines and accelerate the adoption of cloud-based industry digitization applications to produce data that can be utilized in improving productivity, reducing emissions and lowering fuel costs.
The announcement was made public in Shangai, after GE pledged an $11 million digital space, where it plans to incubate startups and foster developing software applications. The space will provide a launching pad for developers to create new software based on GE’s Predix operating system, which Huawei is also now planning to leverage as its “preferred” platform, GE said.
While GE in turn would leverage Huawei’s product portfolio and “co-create end-to-end applications for customers using its enterprise grade technology”. In September, it said its portfolio of software-related products would yield more than $5 billion in revenue in 2015, swelling to more than $15 billion by 2020.
Bill Ruh, CEO, GE Digital, said:
“The growth of the Industrial Internet in China demands not only capital and development from companies like GE and our partners, but also a commitment to align the private and public sector to build together.”
“We are very pleased to become a strategic partner of Huawei in IIoT. We look forward to joining forces with leaders from every industry, including our customers, partners, and developers from around the world, to realize the brilliant vision for IIoT,” Ruh added.
According to ZDNet, William Xu, Executive Director of the board and Chief Strategy Marketing Officer, Huawei, said:
“The next decade is critical for the transition to digital economy. Industry digitization will require connectivity among a huge number of devices, Big Data computing, and smart applications. No single company can address all these challenges on its own. Companies need to collaborate openly with partners and integrate resources and capabilities from partners in order to contribute to customers’ success.”
John Rice, Vice Chairman, GE said it was difficult to calculate the potential size of the “industrial internet” market.
“It’s potentially bigger than any estimates I’ve seen, because these capabilities are all going to be developed,” he told Reuters in an interview.
Earlier, GE had paired up with Microsoft in shifting Predix to Azure cloud platform and offering Platform-as-a-Service for users of the connected industrial IoT business.