Manufacturing Magazine October 2022 | Page 21

providers and the main cloud hubs . This connectivity with the public cloud has to be flexible ( with the ability to switch cloud connections ) and resilient , with route diversity . Having the capacity for all that sensor data is utterly vital – not just for today , but for the future – as volumes expand and processing requirements change . For this reason , organisations also need edge providers to offer them effective , next-gen cloud tools to manage all their environments . It is inevitable that most manufacturers will continue to operate hybrid architectures , using on-premises environments as well as multiple clouds for various workloads , as appropriate .
“ Yet this can easily become difficult to manage and rack up high costs , even before an organisation adopts edge computing . A manufacturer with edge applications that also needs to reconfigure its workloads or integrate new types of application will find it extremely challenging without edge-enabled management tools providing a single pane of glass on all environments .”
Q . ANY FINAL WORDS ?

» “ Security is another consideration that is always raised whenever IoT technologies are under scrutiny . Many of these concerns are allayed by SD-WAN technology , which both optimises and monitors network traffic flows , automating many important tasks such as device configuration and patching . New security approaches are summed up in the acronym SASE , allied to zero-trust technologies that also shut the doors on hackers and cyber-criminals .

“ There can surely be no debate that the future of manufacturing is at the edge . The time has come for the sector to overcome its lack of knowledge about the relationships between 5G and edge computing , seeking out providers with the insight and experience to know what works best . With the right edge infrastructure partner , manufacturing organisations can transform their operations and create new products , services and business models .” manufacturingglobal . com 21