Transcript 0:00 [gentle music] I really think of IoT as a technology paradigm and less of a well-defined single market, just like relational database technology. Is there a market for relational databases? 0:16 Well, it kind of shows up in many different areas. 0:19 Similarly, as the IoT, quote, unquote, "market" has evolved and matured, what we've seen, particularly over the last couple of years at PTC, is the conversations are more centered around a different word, digital transformation. 0:35 [upbeat music] Welcome back to The Peggy Smedley Show, the podcasting voice of IoT and digital transformation. Hello, listeners, and welcome back to The Peggy Smedley Show. 0:52 My next guest looks after the intersection of customer solutions, platforms, and opportunities for the Internet of Things. 0:59 He is responsible for strategy development, development and execution of PTC's industrial IoT business segment. 1:07 A veteran technologist with more than twenty years of experience, he has worked as a software engineer, architect, consultant, and technology leader in both startups and Fortune 500 companies. 1:19 In addition, he is a published author and a featured speaker at technology conferences worldwide, including a TEDx talk. 1:27 Please join me in welcoming Joe Byron, Chief Technology Officer for IoT and General Manager of ThingWorx at PTC. Joe, welcome back to the show. Hey, Peggy. It's great to be back on. 1:40 Oh my gosh, your, your announcements always give me goosebumps. Like [laughs]... [laughs] "Is that me she's talking about?" That's great. [laughs] It actually is you. And you know what? 1:48 It's always great having you on the show because I'm always admire all the things that you do and you continue to do. I mean, your resume is just impressive. 1:58 I mean, when people think about all the things you've done and what you continue to do, I just love having a chance to talk with you. Oh my gosh. Thanks, Peggy. 2:05 It's been a while since we've talked, a couple of years, I think. Yeah. 2:09 And w- you know, just before the show, you and I were trying to remember the last time we talked, and, and I think when we looked at it, it was back in 2017. 2:16 I can't believe it's been 2017 since the last time I think you were on the show. I know. It, it feels like it was about a year ago, but at the same time, I think about 10 years of PTC life has gone by since then. I... 2:28 With the things- So much has happened... with all the things you guys are doing, I think that's true. In fact, that's what I wanna kind of talk about today. Mm-hmm. 2:34 I think what I'm most interested in, and I think my listeners are always interested, because you guys are always doing so many things, is I think I wanna really kind of dive into customers and what they're implementing, because I think when we think about the things today, everybody says, "How can I do these things?" 2:50 You know, is IoT really happening? Everyone says, "Well, you know, COVID right now is kind of lit a fire under everybody in, in digital transformation." 2:57 But I, I think I want you to talk about what are these key cases, these use cases that customers are really finding the most success with right now. Yeah, that's a great question, Peggy. 3:08 You know, you and I have been talking about IoT for a long time, and I really think of IoT as a technology paradigm and less of a well-defined single market, just like relational database technology. 3:24 Is there a market for relational databases? Well, it kind of shows up in many different areas. 3:29 Similarly, as the IoT, quote, unquote, "market" has evolved and matured, what we've seen, particularly over the last couple of years at PTC, is the conversations are more centered around a different word, digital transformation. 3:46 And just to unpack digital transformation, we're talking about digital technology is not new technology, right? We've been h- we've been in a digital revolution for decades, our, most of our lifetimes, right? 3:58 But for enterprises that have aspects of their businesses that have not yet been well-served with digitization, manufacturing efficiency, for example, operational, uh, efficiency for delivering service to products, uh, as being used in their customers' operations, IoT has been the catalyst, the technology paradigm that has sparked the movement of those aspects of enterprise business operations to take advantage of IoT and very complementary technologies that have also matured over the same timeframe: artificial intelligence, augmented reality. 4:39 So this cocktail of new technology paradigms has been powering the digital transformation objectives to satisfy challenges that have always been there, but are now uniquely satisfied with those technologies. 4:55 When you talk about that, when you talk about AR, digital twin, AI, all of these things have really propelled in the digital transformation for customers. 5:06 Is there any one industry when we say that, and we, we talk about it being not this, this evolution, this paradigm, this catalyst that you talk about, have more industries, specific industries, so to speak, markets, embraced this transformation faster than others then? 5:23 I think it's, I think it's about the closeness that certain industries have been to the solution. They just needed that one more bit. 5:31 They needed the connectivity or they needed the analytics intersected with or maybe multiplied with the size of the problem that they had. 5:41 So for example, in manufacturing, process and discrete manufacturing, particularly in process, it's very common, very mature at this stage, that automation has been applied to process manufacturing and discrete manufacturing. 5:59 Automation in the form of controllers, and those controllers can throw off digital exhaust, so to speak, about the status of the controller, which can be then used to understand the status of the process.Which can then be applied to understand the overall efficiency of the manufacturing operation. 6:18 Because that automation was in place and we just needed to unlock it through IoT, through high volume data storage, through advanced analytics, through machine learning models that are trained on the common problems in manufacturing, the common failure scenarios for machinery, we've seen high levels of adoption for our IoT technology in those manufacturing settings because they just needed that one last bit to unlock the potential. 6:45 In a slightly different area, for product OEMs who sell complex assets and then offer a service contract with those assets, so think about blood analyzers in laboratories, think about CNC machines that also happen to show up in manufacturing operations, the OEMs delivering the service for their products as their customers use the products at their own sites desperately need remote connectivity to those assets so that they can proactively diagnose problems, so that they can use machine learning to predict maintenance and so forth. 7:22 So the industries that we see are really slices of larger sectors, the discrete process manufacturing sector and medical equipment, industrial equipment, aerospace and defense, and high technology equipment, uh, which are complex assets deployed at customer sites with after-sale OEM service. 7:43 The challenges though that a lot of these companies and organizations faced before COVID are going to be actually different or might be modified after COVID right now as they think about what they have to bring to market, how fast they have to bring, or let's say building control, how they have to do things. 7:59 We're gonna see a lot of things change now with what they have to do. 8:04 Is that going to be something you have to kind of help companies and businesses understand the ecosystems that they're involved with are going to change? 8:12 There's gonna be a whole new way of thinking, I hate using the word the new normal, but there's going to be something now, but it'll change long term and maybe go back to the old way, but there's gonna be this transformation in a different way than what we thought about a year ago that's what's gonna be two years, three years, maybe even five years that you're gonna have to help them with. 8:33 Yeah, absolutely. 8:34 I mean, w- what we've seen over the last several months has been a bullet behind some of the use cases that our customers were interested in deploying, but now they've rocketed to the top of their digital transformation lists. 8:48 That's crazy. So for example, I mentioned the remote service for product OEMs. Um, I was giving another analyst briefing just at the outset of the COVID lockdown in March. 9:00 We were still sitting in our Boston headquarters in the Seaport of Boston, and I was looking over at Mass General Hospital, and I was thinking, "How many of the medical devices being used at Mass General right now are being remotely serviced by our customers who are using our IoT software to remotely service their equipment? 9:21 And how many of those service technicians would've instead been out getting... gotten into vans and driving out into Mass General to do on-site diagnostics?" Today, they're sitting in their pajamas at home- [laughs]... 9:33 still providing the same service because of the remote connectivity. 9:37 So for sure, that remote diagnostic, that interactive troubleshooting and proactive troubleshooting that can be done with IoT, that use case has rocketed to the top of the priority list. 9:49 And thankfully, it's a, it's a technology paradigm that we're very comfortable with. 9:53 We've been deploying that for years, but we've seen a shift in, "Oh my gosh, that is exactly what I need to deal with my distributed workforce who may not be showing up in a brick and mortar location anymore or not as often." 10:06 Is that then when you think that, that needed to happen, we needed to see from, uh, from a medical industry, we needed to see that, but other things that are going to change, let's say smart cities, we're going to see this dramatic shift in the way that happens, that maybe there, there's gonna be some shifting of way product and product strategy is going to have to play a role i- and again, with HVAC systems and things like that, are we going to see air ventilation... 10:36 There, there will be some shifting that maybe it, it, again, r- rocket to the top like you just described that are, we're not prepared for this, but medical was prepared. 10:47 Medical was prepared, but, uh, it's funny you mention HVAC because what we're, what we're seeing for let's call it building infrastructure, you know, combine the, the specter of a COVID-like future situation, which none of us want to see, but now we're very acutely aware that that's a possibility, combine that with the aging workforce problem, which is a real problem that we've been talking about for a while with our customers, the idea that there's a handful of experienced service technicians who can show up on site and diagnose the air conditioning units of a hotel or a, a business, um, office park while we have the technology for a remote or even a completely automated self-service helper through IoT and augmented reality allow the on-site building management personnel to diagnose the issues and, and alleviate the issues with machinery even though they are not experts in that product or model, that is very powerful. 11:46 And this is not to displace current service technicians, this is to give the current service technicians superpowers so they can address more issues and scale their expertise. 12:00 I have to tell you, Joe, I would really love to just get into your brain there and talk about what's next in the product strategy, but we're out of time. So Joe Byron- Oh. [laughs]... 12:08 Chief Technology Officer of the Internet of Things and General Manager of ThingWorx at PTC, thank you so much for your time today. 12:15 Where can our listeners go to just learn about all these things that you're talking about, AR, VR, digital twin? Where can they learn more about all this stuff? 12:23 For sure, ptc.com, and we've got a plethora of customer case studies, documentation on how solutions on, for digital transformation can be achieved with the right technologies. 12:36 So Joe, promise me it's not gonna be another two, three years before you come back and you're on the show. We can make that pact right now between you and I, Peggy, for sure. All right. Thank you so much. All right. 12:45 Remember, listeners, we are broadcast live every Tuesday at 12:00 PM Central. Check out our website at connectedworld.com or The Peggy Smedley Show at thepeggysmedleyshow.com. 12:54 But most importantly, tweet at us at connectedwmed, 'cause I'm sure with questions and things you have, we'll get Joe to answer them. All right. 13:01 This is The Peggy Smedley Show, the podcasting voice of IoT and digital transformation. And remember, with great technology comes great responsibility. Have an awesome week. [outro music]
