RFID News Roundup

Industrial Internet Consortium, Openfog Consortium Unite

The Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC) and the OpenFog Consortium have announced that they have finalized details to combine their efforts. The two organizations will work together under the IIC umbrella to drive the momentum of the Industrial Internet, including the development and promotion of industry guidance and best practices for fog and edge computing.

This announcement brings OpenFog members into the IIC at a time when their complementary areas of technology are emerging in the mainstream, the organizations report. The first formal meeting of the unified organization will be held in Raleigh, N.C., on Feb. 11-14. The IIC has also announced that the IIC Steering Committee, which guides the strategic direction of the organization, has elected two OpenFog principals:

• Ron Zahavi, Microsoft's chief strategist for IoT standards, is focused on IoT standards and consortia, and leads Microsoft's Worldwide IoT Architecture Community. He has experience in all aspects of technology management and solution delivery, including IoT solutions. Matt Vasey, Microsoft's director of AI and IoT business development, will serve as Zahavi's alternate.

• Mung Chiang, Purdue University's John A. Edwardson Dean of the College of Engineering, was previously the Arthur LeGrand Doty Professor at Princeton University and founded the Princeton EDGE Lab in 2009. The lab bridges the theory-practice gap in edge computing and networking research by spanning from proofs to prototypes. Chiang received the 2013 Alan T. Waterman Award for his contributions to networking R&D.

"This agreement brings together the two most important organizations shaping the Industrial Internet of Things. The combined organization offers greater influence to members, more clarity to the market, and a lower-risk path to the future for end users. We will be the center of gravity for the future of Industrial IoT systems across industry verticals," said Stan Schneider, the IIC Steering Committee's CEO of real-time innovations and vice-chair, in a prepared statement. "We welcome the experience and vision that Ron Zahavi and Mung Chiang bring to our Steering Committee."

"We are excited to take the first steps toward integrating the OpenFog Working Groups, Testbeds and Use Cases with those of the IIC," said Matt Vasey, OpenFog's chairman and president, and Microsoft's director of AI and IoT business development, in the prepared statement. "Our membership is highly motivated to contribute at every level to continue the advancement of fog technology in the Industrial Internet."