Digital as a Lever to Growth

A “touch & feel” approach was at the forefront of the annual Siemens Italy meeting in their new HQ building in Via Vipiteno, Milan. Following the traditional presentation of the 2017 balance (with very positive annual results) and strategies for 2018, there was a guided tour of the labs, offering journalists the chance to “get to grips” with Siemens all Italian knowledge base.

At the end of January, Siemens Italy organized its traditional annual press conference for the presentation of its balance sheet. Welcoming visitors to its new “home” in Via Vipiteno, the event featured an all new format, with journalists able to get hands on with Siemens all Italian know-how.
During the tour of the SiemensLab, applications already in use in the Digital Factory, Energy Management and Building Technologies were shown off, effectively, all of Siemens innovation currently coming to market.
Federico Golla, President and CEO, underlined Siemens’ desire to change its public image. “We are especially pleased with this new “home” as it gives us the opportunity to create a real Touch & feel relationship with the technology”.
Mention has to be made of the group’s very positive 2017 results, revenues at over €83bn, created by a workforce now totaling 377,000 (10% of which is involved in R&D), €5bn investment in Research and Development. Siemens Italy figures are just as encouraging: €2bn revenues, above all, thanks to the digital transformation which is now bearing fruit; 3,200 team members, 25% female, all of whom are working in smart mobility from January 1st.
The locomotives pushing growth are the industrial and infrastructure divisions. The former, split into two sections, Digital Factory and Process Drives and Industries have reached some spectacular results partly thanks to the Italian government’s Industry 4.0 plan, which has encouraged the shift to a digitalized workplace, across the country.
This focus on digitalization has also changed the nature of the transmission and energy grid business, where innovative solutions to monitoring and IoT connectivity of assets at sub power plants for the virtual power plant have been developed. Work is, of course, not stopping on the roll out of electric vehicle recharge point infrastructure.
Digital service revenues for 2017 reached €5.2bn, with growth of 20% on the previous year.
Golla also emphasized the changes in company portfolio, following the acquisition of IT companies and the birth Siemens Gamesa in Wind Power, Siemens Alstom in rail and mobility, and Siemens Healthineers in healthcare: three companies that will turn over €40bn in the coming year.

Digital consolidation, the backbone of 2018 company strategy
2018 will see a further consolidation of the client focused approach for Siemens. Thanks to know-how in the fields of electrification, automation and digitalization, clients gain advantage across the board.
A major step in this context is that of MindSphere, the cloud based OS for IoT (Internet of Things), offering both connectivity and a range of industrial applications giving all companies, independent of their size or sector, the opportunity to collect data from machinery or plant, analyzing it to optimize working practice.
Such information makes productivity and efficiency far higher, both for single pieces of machinery and for whole plants, not
forgetting the creation of predictive maintenance, identifying problems at such an early stage that it becomes possible to solve problems before they lead to interruption in production.
Cloud based technology is, of course, far more than just a decentralized data archive, it increases efficiency and improves cash flow thanks to its elasticity and ability to supply IT services on demand.
Finally, MindSphere supplies a wide range of applications for many functions and uses (MindApps). Clients and partners can develop their own apps on the platform. These apps create new services, which, through the efficient use of data, create a competitive advantage thanks to guaranteed availability of machinery, optimal use of resources and greater productivity.

Open labs at the new headquarters
As has been mentioned, following the presentation of the financial results, a guided tour around various Siemens laboratories was organized. The first concerning electric mobility with the presentation of the E-car Operation Center, an IT platform, entirely developed in Italy, which will manage the infrastructure of re-charging stations, and which has earned the Italian Energy Management division recognition as Global Competence Center.
The Siemens E-Car Operation Center (E-Car OC) is based on cloud technology which will manage private and public recharging. The software, natively connected to remote controlled energy distribution systems, is set up to send recharging data (consumption, authorization etc.) to the billing system chosen by the end user. This completes the inter-operation loop across the charging infrastructure thanks to the same roaming logic that has been in use for many years in the telecommunications sector.

Next up was the medium voltage switch monitoring and diagnostics laboratory.
Here the Assetguard MVC monitoring system was on display concerning these switches which are often exposed to extreme weather conditions and whose functioning is rarely modified. The monitoring system checks the reliability of any such intervention, opening and closing circuit functioning and the condition of main contacts.
Should the data measured or calculated not correspond to that set in the system, the signal for the need to carry out maintenance on a component, for example the command panel, will be received. This makes programming maintenance and substituting components much more efficient, making the switch more reliable and, above all, cutting costs connected to unforeseen repairs.
Assetguard MVC can be integrated, as an autonomous component in the client SCADA system and the ISCM (Integrated Substation Condition Monitoring) platform. The devices can be combined with other monitoring systems, easing user diagnosis even when analyzing third party equipment.
The tour finished up with a visit to the control room where facility management takes place with a focus on sustainability. Thanks to Navigator – the cloud integrated platform, which provides energy consumption data, it is possible to measure the long term performance of a single building, a number of buildings or even an entire complex of residential or industrial units. In short, a complete view of the infrastructure panorama. Navigator connects the most important data concerning energy provision and consumption, improving system performance. It also allows the user to check and compare how buildings are performing and measure their sustainability levels.