Siemens expands leadership role in industrial digitalization; sets up 20 centres

Munich [Germany]: Global technology powerhouse Siemens has gained further momentum in digitalization and has announced set up of 20 centers for digital customer applications in the industrial sector.

These new solutions are being developed on MindSphere, Siemens' open, cloud-based operating system for the Internet of Things (IoT).

Moreover, to be close to its customers, the company has distributed its 20 centers across around 50 locations in 17 countries worldwide.

"We're continuously expanding our leadership role in industrial digitalization," said President and CEO, Siemens, Joe Kaeser.

"With our global experience in electrification and automation and our industrial software expertise, we're generating optimal benefits for our customers; benefits that no other companies can replicate at such high levels of performance," he added.

Siemens launched its MindSphere IoT operating system across the company about a year ago.

Approximately, one million devices and systems are now connected together via MindSphere, and this figure will reach 1.25 million by the end of fiscal 2018.

Moreover, beginning in January 2018, MindSphere will also be available on Amazon Web Services. This partnership further brings Siemens together with the international number one in cloud solutions.

As a result, users will enjoy the benefits of a more powerful development environment, additional analysis functions and expanded connectivity. For example, immense amounts of system-generated data will be quickly and efficiently captured, evaluated and used, to improve system performance and availability.

This technology will also help customers evaluate and employ their data to gain new types of insights. For example, downtimes can be predicted and prevented and conclusions drawn about a product and its manufacturing process. Users can also develop completely new business models using the technology.

During fiscal 2017, Siemens further extended its lead in software solutions and digital services.

The revenue from digital technologies, for instance, rose to €5.2 billion, of which €4 billion was attributable to software and €1.2 billion to digital services.

This corresponded to a 20 percent increase year-over-year and means that Siemens clearly outpaced market growth of about eight percent.

"We are now speeding up digitalization even further," said CTO, Siemens, Roland Busch.

"We are using our industry know-how to scale the solutions and further broaden the business. With our MindSphere Application Centers, we're providing optimal support to our customers around the globe as they embrace the digital age," he added.

To further accelerate the innovation process, Siemens will again increase its research and development (R&D) expenditures in fiscal 2018 and invest an additional sum of around €450 million.

As a result, R&D spending will increase from about €5.2 billion in fiscal 2017 to over €5.6 billion in fiscal 2018.