Advantech Co (研華) yesterday previewed its vision for an Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) market, which it said would gradually take shape in the next five to 10 years and add value to the company’s hardware offerings
The world’s largest industrial computer supplier aims to sow the seeds for the IIoT market through a “cocreation” model, making early bets on developers of intelligent solutions that would be powered by its cloud computing platform, Advantech chairman K.C. Liu (劉克振) said.
IIoT applications would become widely implemented across a multitude of industries and Advantech is working closely with industry professionals to integrate their knowledge with the coming technology shift and create solution-ready packages (SRPs), Liu said at a news conference at the company’s IoT Campus in New Taipei City’s Linkou District (林口).
Eventually, the SRPs would become an important aspect of the IIoT supply chain, along with sensors, edge computing, communications, and platform as a service (PaaS) and other cloud-based services.
Edge computing is a method of optimizing cloud computing by having some computation performed at the device level, whereas PaaS involves providing companies with the cloud infrastructure necessary to build and maintain applications.
However, the IIoT space is fragmented, and the company is working hard to create standardized and easily duplicated SRPs based on a combination of software and hardware products that could be rolled out by system integrators, Liu said.
Advantech showcased nine SRP partners that are developing intelligent solutions for managing hospital wards, vehicle fleets, factory equipment and other facilities.
The company in March approved plans to acquire a 19 percent stake in Nippon RAD Inc to help it become a leading system integrator in the vast Japanese market, Liu added.
Advantech has been offering its WISE PaaS service, a new cloud-enabled platform, at a very accessible price for its development partners during the growth stage, he said.
The company has also scaled down its venture capital activities to focus on investing in its development partners and acquiring stakes of 20 to 30 percent in like-minded IIoT start-ups and partners, Liu said.
“We expect US$500 million in overall incremental revenue gains by 2023,” Liu said, adding that the smart factory, or Industry 4.0, and smart city solutions segments would see the fastest IIoT deployment.
Liu envisions that the IIoT market would be divided into two segments: Half of the potential revenues would be controlled by hardware and software platform providers such as Advantech, while the other half would represented by SRP providers, he said.
The scheme would add value to Advantech’s hardware offerings, similar to how iPhones garnered popularity through Apple’s software and services, he said.
“We supply the beef to supply the steakhouses that would be opened up by our SRP partners,” Liu added.
Meanwhile, the company said it would be ready to unveil 30 SRPs at its IoT Co-Creation Summit which is scheduled for November in Suzhou, China.
Taiwanese firms have increased investment in the Philippines in recent years as Manila’s ties with Washington deepen and global supply chains continue to shift away from China, an expert at the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The Philippines had not been among Taiwanese investors’ top choices in Southeast Asia, CIER Taiwan ASEAN Studies Center director Kristy Hsu (徐遵慈) said at a seminar in Taipei. However, Taiwan’s investment in the country has grown significantly since the COVID-19 pandemic, reaching US $257 million last year, a high in recent years, she said. Although Taiwan’s total investment in the Philippines still lags
Intel Corp regards Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) as a longstanding partner, as the US chipmaker would continue outsourcing production of advanced chips to TSMC, Intel chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) said yesterday. “I don’t look at people as competitors. I look at the collaboration... Nvidia is also, you know, a good friend,” Tan told a news conference following his keynote speech at the Computex trade show in Taipei. “It’s a very trusted partnership for us... We are a big, top customer for them, and we’re going to continue doing that,” he said, referring to TSMC, the world’s largest foundry
Artificial intelligence (AI) agents would supplant smartphones as the center of people’s digital lives, fundamentally reshaping personal devices and driving a major computing upgrade cycle, Qualcomm Inc CEO Cristiano Amon said yesterday. In his keynote speech for this year’s Computex trade show in Taipei, Amon said that the rise of "agentic AI" — AI systems capable of reasoning, planning and carrying out tasks autonomously — would transform how people interact with technology across phones, PCs, vehicles and wearable devices. Describing the technology as the next major evolution in computing, Amon said that "2026 is the year of agents.” For decades, smartphones have sat
The average pay to employees by ASE Technology Holding Co (日月光投控) was the highest among the companies listed on the local main board last year, while contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) ranked seventh, the Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE) said on Monday. Data compiled by the exchange showed ASE Technology, the world’s largest chip packaging and testing services provider, paid its employees an average of NT$6.28 million (US$199,746) last year, up 40 percent from a year earlier. TSMC, the world’s largest contract chipmaker and the most profitable company in Taiwan, paid its employees NT$4.09 million on average, up
RSS