The Industrial Internet Consortium (IIC) has announced the release of its IIC RFP Toolkit, a collection of best practices and online tools to help guide Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) project managers, as well as procurement managers and buyers, through the process of procuring the various components and resources required for a complete IIoT solution.
“Digital Transformation (DX) projects require unique procurement skills to navigate the considerations needed when building an RFP [request for proposals],” said Dirk Slama, director of the Co-innovation Hub at Ferdinand-Steinbeis-Institute, in a prepared statement. “The procurement process for a typical IoT project is quite different from that of an enterprise software project.”
The IIC RFP Toolkit comprises six modules developed by the IIC member ecosystem of Industrial Internet of Things technology users, vendors and consultants. These modules are: Challenges, Risks and Mitigation; Project Planning; RFP Creation; RFP Wizard; RFP Distribution and Vendor Selection; and Expert Advice and Discussion.
“This IIC toolkit helps IIoT project managers and procurement managers/buyers through the process of procuring all the different components and resources required for a complete end-to-end IIoT solution,” explained Jim Morrish, Transforma Insights‘ founding partner, in the prepared statement. “The RFP wizard helps users create and manage effective RFPs for IIoT solutions, helping to ensure that users of IIoT technology are using the right partners and getting the best possible IIoT solution for the most affordable price.”
The Industrial Internet Consortium, a program of the Object Management Group, is focused on transforming business and society by accelerating the Industrial Internet of Things. Its mission is to deliver transformative business value to organizations, industry and society by accelerating the adoption of a trustworthy Internet of Things. The toolkit is accessible for free at the IIC Resource Hub, a central repository for the collective resources of the IIC community. Conversations about common challenges and crowd-sourced answers from IIC members can be found on the IIC Community Forum, where industry experts can exchange ideas and discuss Industrial IoT problems.
“As companies struggle to ensure they are successfully setting up their digital transformation projects, it becomes more important to see what the rest of the market is doing, and that’s exactly what we’ve provided with the IIC RFP Toolkit,” said Bassam Zarkout, IGnPower‘s executive VP, in the prepared statement. “Our ecosystem of members, from across the IIoT landscape, provide insights and lessons they learnt from their own projects and created the modules in the RFP Toolkit. The IIC ecosystem is unparalleled in its ability to crowdsource solutions and share best practices to solve IIoT and digital transformation challenges.”
In addition, the IIC has partnered with CESMII–The Smart Manufacturing Institute to accelerate the development, adoption and monetization of IIoT technologies, infrastructure and solutions, and to drive digital transformation. According to the IIC, this will enable manufacturers to benefit from the strategic harmonization of reference architectures, testbeds, knowledge and key smart manufacturing technologies, across all industries, including small and medium enterprises.
Joint IIC and CESMII activities will include realizing solution interoperability by harmonizing technology components and other elements through coordination, collaboration, and standardization; aligning work in horizontal domains for adoption within vertical domains and use cases; and delivering thought leadership and knowledge exchange through joint seminars and ecosystem and workforce-development activities.
“Digital transformation is at the heart of the next generation of smart manufacturing, bringing a host of benefits,” said Wael William Diab, the chair of the IIC Liaison Working Group and secretary of the IIC Steering Committee, in a separate prepared message. “We are looking forward to collaborating with CESMII and sharing the goal of innovation to accelerate the digitalization of industry.”
“Resilient manufacturing and supply chains demand a much greater degree of data and application interoperability,” added John Dyck, CESMII’s CEO, in the prepared statement. “CESMII is committed to democratizing smart manufacturing technologies and knowledge to scale innovation. This IIC partnership will help us achieve those goals, establishing standard means for data modeling, information sharing and solutions interoperability.”