Siemens Launches Platform for IoT, Smart Buildings, Digital Twins

Siemens AG has launched an open digital business platform, Siemens Xcelerator, to accelerate digital transformation and value creation for customers of all sizes in industry, buildings, grids and mobility. The business platform makes digital transformation easier, faster and scalable.

Siemens Xcelerator includes a curated portfolio of internet of things (IoT) enabled hardware, software and digital services from across Siemens and certified third parties; a growing ecosystem of partners; and an evolving marketplace to facilitate interactions and transactions between customers, partners and developers.

Roland Busch, President and CEO of Siemens AG, said: “Siemens Xcelerator will make it easier than ever before for companies to navigate digital transformation – faster and at scale. By combining the real and the digital worlds across operational and information technology, we empower customers and partners to boost productivity, competitiveness and scale up innovations.”

“Our leading portfolio is transformed towards more open applications, with more cloud-based and as-a-service solutions and IoT-enabled hardware that can be constantly upgraded. At the same time, collaboration will reach a new level with a growing ecosystem of partners.”

The open digital business platform creates value for participants by facilitating interactions and fostering innovation between multiple parties – customers, partners, developers etc. as no one can do it alone. With the launch of Siemens Xcelerator, step-by-step, Siemens will transform its entire portfolio of hardware and software to become modular, cloud-connected and built on standard application programming interfaces (APIs). The highest standards and value for all parties will be ensured by strong technical and commercial governance principles. Siemens and third-party offerings will adhere to the design principles of interoperability, flexibility, openness and as-a-service.

Siemens announced the first new SaaS offering as part of Siemens Xcelerator. Building X is a new smart building suite to create a single source of truth (SSOT) that takes complexity out of digitalization and supports customers to achieve their net zero goals. It is an end-to-end data and analytics suite breaking down data silos across domains such as energy management, security and building maintenance. Building X is a modular, fully cloud-based open software suite, with AI enabled applications, strong connectivity and built-in cybersecurity.

On Monday, June 27, 2022, Siemens announced the agreement to purchase Brightly Software, a U.S.-based asset and maintenance management software company. The acquisition will add Brightly‘s well-established capabilities across key sectors to Siemens’ digital and software know-how in buildings. It will be a core element of the Siemens Xcelerator for Buildings portfolio.

Siemens also plans to integrate its industrial internet of things (IIoT) solutions for industry as Industrial Operations X, which brings together solutions and applications from sensor to edge to cloud, IoT as-a-service and low code development capabilities, as well as a wide range of ready-to-use-apps. It enables the fusion of data from the real world of automation with the digital world of information technology, enriched by Siemens’ comprehensive vertical IT/ OT integration knowledge and capabilities. Breaking down data silos will help companies to increase their performance, productivity, flexibility and sustainability.

Siemens commits to join forces and grow a strong partner ecosystem, building on existing strategic partnerships including Accenture, Atos, AWS, Bentley, Microsoft and SAP. The intention is to expand the partnership ecosystem with small, medium and large companies.

The first major partnership agreement under the Siemens Xcelerator umbrella is with NVIDIA. The two companies today announced an expansion of their partnership to enable the industrial metaverse and increase use of AI-driven digital twin technology that will help bring industrial automation to a new level. As a first step in this collaboration, the companies plan to connect Siemens Xcelerator, the open digital business platform and NVIDIA Omniverse, a platform for 3D-design and collaboration. This will enable an industrial metaverse with physics-based digital models from Siemens and AI-enabled, physically accurate, real-time simulation from NVIDIA where companies make decisions faster and with increased confidence.

The launch of the Siemens Xcelerator platform is the logical next step in Siemens’ digital strategy. Siemens will be able to unlock significant value for existing and new customers, especially new ones in the segment of smaller and mid-sized businesses.

As part of the launch, Siemens confirms its growth targets for digital business announced at the last years’ capital market day, of a compound annual growth rate of around 10 percent over the business cycle. Digital revenue in fiscal year 2021 stood at €5.6 billion. The launch of the business platform is also consistent with its move towards as-a-service offerings and will bolster the aim of increasing annual recurring revenue.

Roland Busch added: “This is the logical next step in the implementation of our digitalization strategy to enable even faster innovation and value creation. Siemens Xcelerator brings the power of our focused technology company together with a thriving ecosystem of technology partners. We are joining together to simplify digital transformation so that customers of all sizes can benefit at speed and scale.”