Microsoft and GE Digital Announce IoT Innovation Partnership

Microsoft has announced an expansion of its collaborations with General Electric's GE Digital division. The company's say they are teaming to drive IoT growth across industries. In an announcement, the two giants say this marks their biggest partnership ever. GE and Microsoft will pool their technology to help companies remove barriers preventing digital transformation. Microsoft Azure will now play a key role in GE Digital's operations. The company will standardize its Predix solutions on Azure, integration Predix into Microsoft services such as Azure Data and Analytics and Azure IoT. The announcement was eager to emphasize this is a true partnership. To that end, Microsoft and GE Digital will sell IoT solutions together. “The industrial sector plays an important role in fueling economies around the world,” says Judson Althoff, Executive Vice President, Microsoft. “With this strategic partnership, GE and our mutual customers will benefit from a trusted platform with the flexibility and scalability to deliver unprecedented results and help advance their business potential.”  Development of IoT pilots and concept hardware is already underway. Predix integration in Azure will create a powerful combination. The GE Digital solution is an app development platform that allows companies to build and scale IIoT applications.

Azure Across GE Infrastructure

The platform has already been adopted by major organizations and the developer community has created thousands of applications. By combining Microsoft's enterprise cloud footprint and GE's industrial data applications, customers receive a faster deploying digital transformation. “Every industrial company will have to master digital to compete in the future, connecting machines and making them more intelligent to drive efficiency and productivity,” says Bill Ruh, Chief Digital Officer, GE and CEO, GE Digital. “Our customers are asking for us to make a deeper connection between our two companies. Through this expanded partnership, Microsoft and GE are enabling customers around the world to harness the power of the Predix portfolio, including Predix Asset Performance Management, to unlock new capabilities to drive growth.” GE says it will use Microsoft Azure throughout its organization. Integration will include within IT workloads and productivity tools. The company says it can use Microsoft's cloud expertise to push digital innovation. Divisions under the GE umbrella can use Microsoft various enterprise-grade tools. These will all be managed within the Predix platform.