LiveWorx 2016: Physical Meets Digital

You’d be hard-pressed to find an engineer these days who isn’t familiar with the term “democratization.” It’s been a buzzword for discussing topics such as simulation, HPC (high-performance computing), 3D printing and beyond. But at PTC’s LiveWorx, held June 6-9 in Boston, the company focused on democratizing a completely different sector: the Internet of Things.

“Most people think of the Internet of Things as a way to connect, optimize and automate everyday products,” said Jim Heppelmann, CEO and president of PTC. “But we think [at PTC] that physical/digital convergence must expand to include how humans interact with it.”

With this sentiment, the company showcased a whole new set of tools for analytics, smart product development and augmented reality for the enterprise. “There’s no question that the IoT is one of the biggest game-changing innovative technologies of our time,“Heppelmann said. “The actual DNA of [these products] is much complicated than it used to be. The type of product we’re talking about today is part physical, part digital, on the edge and up in the cloud.”

A Whole New Reality 

Last year, PTC made a splash with its Digital Twin. Being one step closer to bringing physical and digital data together, this year’s LiveWorx unveiled a next-generation technology: augmented reality (AR). The company announced Vuforia Enterprise, a suite designed to help bring AR into the enterprise.

The ultimate goal is to provide a codeless authoring and publishing AR workflow. 3D CAD data can be integrated through a “ThingMark,” an update on QR technology for the IoT. The technology is built on Vuforia and ThingWorx software, but also integrates capabilities from PTC’s Creo and Windchill, according to Heppelmann.

With Vuforia, users can access CAD data and additional models through ThingMarks. Image courtesy of PTC.

With its new Vuforia technology, the goal is to help bring “mixed reality” into the enterprise for applications in every industry, bridging the gap between physical and digital product design. Beyond Vuforia, PTC also wants to help accelerate physical product design with agile engineering and its AgileWorx offering.

Data Everywhere

Since the emergence of the IoT, companies have been trying to develop a way to process all the data that’s collected from various connected devices. “Data is the new oil and analytics is the new refinery,” said Heppelmann. As a part of fleshing out its software offerings, the company has rebranded and expanded its ColdLight acquisition as ThingWorx Analytics.

According to PTC, ThingWorx Analytics gives engineers the opportunity to add real-time pattern and anomaly detection, as well as predictive analytics and simulations for product design. The offering is comprised of ThingWatcher, ThingPredictor and ThingOptimizer. It’s also automated ETL, something that PTC identifies as “the messiest part of [the] analytics effort.”

Jim Heppelmann outlines PTC’s strategy for new software and technology. Image courtesy of PTC.

Beyond ThingWorx Analytics, PTC is also forming more industry partnerships with organizations such as HP Enterprise, National Instruments and SAP to deliver real-time edge computing capabilities.

Platforms Galore

Coupled with democratization is the emergence of engineering platforms — entire suites of various softwares to address design complexity. At the center of this new AR technology and softwares is a core platform developed from several acquisitions and softwares, notes PTC. “[This is] a platform we’ve expressly put together for developers and authors of IoT applications and solutions,” said Rob Gremley, group president, Technology Platform Group.

The three major brands that this technology platform includes are Kepware, ThingWorx and Vuforia, said Gremley. “All of these capabilities are connected together,” he said. The goal is to reduce time engineers spend on creating low-level infrastructure for advanced IoT products and workflows. It’s another way to break down adoption barriers for IoT device design.

To further extend capabilities, PTC has also partnered with Amazon Web Services (AWS) to help host ThingWorx designs in the cloud and integrate with AWS’ IoT offerings directly.

Going Forward

Over the past few years, PTC has been shaping itself to be one of the core IoT and digital engineering companies. Yet even with these efforts for democratization, there’s still some issues to address, such as security, widespread adoption and even standards for the IoT. But with LiveWorx, PTC’s new commitment to hybrid digital and physical product design is pushing forward technology to address these concerns. The company is taking out a lot of guesswork for design engineers at the front end, and offering less code-intensive options.

Part of moving IoT forward includes education. During an industry panel, participants echoed the sentiment that a lot of customers are facing issues that IoT can address, but are unsure or unaware of the technology available.

As for more standards, there’s little time for the waiting game, Heppelmann noted, especially when some of this software and technology can help companies already. “We are not close to [IoT] standardization,” he said, “but we also don’t have time to wait. We don’t have time to clean up the mess, we’ll work with standards or not.”