We are pleased to announce the availability of MQTT-enabled SiteWise Edge gateways for AWS IoT SiteWise. This feature allows organizations to establish a cohesive approach to data management, essential for rapid decision-making and continuous optimization of processes.
Modern factories typically incorporate a blend of legacy and contemporary automation systems from various vendors, with software applications ranging from a few years old to several decades. These systems often utilize numerous machine protocols, resulting in multiple data streams that monitor operating parameters such as pressure, temperature, and machine state. Additionally, data from software systems like Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP), Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES), and scheduling tools further complicate the data landscape. The challenge lies in integrating this data to enable swift responses to changing conditions while also preserving detailed information for long-term analysis and optimization.
By implementing MQTT and Unified Name Space (UNS), manufacturers can standardize their data architecture, creating a consistent foundation for data extraction, transformation, and loading for analysis. This integration facilitates a seamless connection between legacy systems and modern applications, ensuring both real-time visibility and historical analysis.
AWS provides a range of specialized services that foster innovation across various sectors, including manufacturing, automotive, and healthcare. AWS IoT services empower you to accelerate innovation securely, from edge to cloud, in an effortless and scalable manner. AWS IoT SiteWise is a managed IoT service designed to simplify the collection, storage, organization, and monitoring of industrial data, helping organizations make informed, data-driven decisions.
AWS IoT SiteWise Edge enhances cloud capabilities by enabling local data collection, processing, and organization while securely transmitting this data to the cloud. To streamline customer experiences, AWS partners with various providers to support numerous protocols and enable user-defined calculations, alarms, events, and edge processing. Notable collaborations include Siemens Industrial Edge, Domatica EasyEdge, and Litmus Edge.
The introduction of MQTT-enabled AWS IoT SiteWise Edge gateways marks a significant evolution, allowing for a publish-and-subscribe (pub-sub) data topology and a hub-and-spoke integration method. Previously, edge software components and custom systems required point-to-point integration using AWS APIs. The new pub-sub and hub-and-spoke concepts leverage the open-source MQTT standard, simplifying integrations and allowing users to structure data according to their needs.
MQTT establishes a logical data hierarchy that reflects operational structures, creating a unified namespace where production data and system information are organized intuitively. The AWS IoT SiteWise Edge gateway acts as the central hub, gathering data via native OPC UA connectivity and certified partner integrations. As data flows through the MQTT architecture, it maintains its contextual relationships, enabling real-time access across operations.
This system combines machine telemetry with metadata from MES and ERP systems, resulting in enriched data streams that provide deeper insights. As data transitions to the cloud via AWS IoT SiteWise Edge, built-in store-and-forward capabilities ensure minimal data loss even during network disruptions. Furthermore, AWS IoT SiteWise allows you to model edge data structures in the cloud, making it a valuable asset for advanced analytics through AWS’s extensive suite of services, from AI/ML tools to data lake solutions.
The Unified Name Space (UNS) approach has been adopted in the industrial sector as a transformative method for data management, offering a standardized framework for integrating, organizing, and normalizing operational data. This architecture pattern creates a dynamic data fabric that extends from the edge of your network to the AWS cloud.
At its core, UNS reflects the natural organization of facilities through an intuitive hierarchical structure. This structure resembles a familiar file system, creating straightforward pathways for data discovery and access. The true power of UNS lies in its event-driven nature: as data is published to a topic, it becomes instantly accessible to subscribed systems, enabling real-time decision-making.
Unlike traditional data architectures focused on storage, UNS acts as a lightweight, dynamic data bus, maintaining current values and relationships without the burden of historical data storage. This efficiency is further enhanced by UNS’s ability to accommodate multiple protocols and transport mechanisms, bridging the gap between legacy systems and contemporary applications.
AWS IoT SiteWise Edge now offers two flexible paths for implementing UNS. You can either set up your UNS using its built-in MQTT broker or integrate with your existing MQTT infrastructure through MQTTv5 broker-to-broker bridging. Whether you are creating a new unified namespace or expanding an established one, AWS IoT SiteWise Edge provides the robust foundation necessary for integrating data from edge to cloud.
In conclusion, MQTT-enabled AWS IoT SiteWise gateways simplify the integration of operational data with equipment telemetry to create actionable insights. By establishing a UNS built on MQTT, you can accurately capture and reflect the physical organization of your equipment and processes. With AWS IoT SiteWise, users can analyze their data structure while maintaining contextual relationships across various data streams. This enables further utilization of data for downstream applications, from AI/ML to data lakes in the AWS cloud.
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