Uptake announced its acquisition of Edmonton-based ShookIOT, strengthening its capabilities to accelerate digital transformation in asset-intensive industries. Bridging the data gap between OT and IT, the ShookIOT and Uptake combination simplifies data migration for easy deployment of Uptake's Industrial AI applications, per the companies, which note that the chemical, oil & gas, and process industries can now cost-effectively clear the primary obstacle in the pursuit of digital transformation: the liberation of clean time-series data from individual assets to the cloud, enabling advanced analytics and augmented decision-making.
"For AI to make good on its promise to the industrial world, operators must be able to unlock data from disparate sources to support frontline decision-making with simple, actionable, and secure software," said Kayne Grau, president of Uptake. "Integrating ShookIOT software within Uptake's applications optimizes the preparation of industrial data for precision analytics. By combining forces, we advance our leading position in this vital SaaS category, enhancing the speed with which we deliver greater reliability, safety, and productivity to industrial operators."
ShookIOT was founded by Leanna Chan and Dr. Dave Shook, two former Matrikon (now a part of Honeywell Advanced Solutions) executives who led the development of data-ingestion software for asset-intensive industries. Responding to the opportunity of the cloud for industrial connectivity, ShookIOT specializes in data collection for enterprise-wide digital workstreams, providing data management and industrial-intelligence software to global process companies.
"Data portability and integrity are the foundation of Industry 4.0, yet many companies—solution providers and operators alike—have struggled to unlock the power of their data, limiting the future value of industrial intelligence through restrictive pre-modeling, drawn-out implementation, and poor cybersecurity," said Dr. Shook, who is taking on the role of chief data officer at Uptake. "We are excited to join Uptake and expand our impact in empowering data integrity and adoption of industrial AI for asset-intensive companies around the globe."
The combined offerings of Uptake and ShookIOT are available via direct deployment or through the Microsoft Azure marketplace. Products include Uptake Fusion Powered by ShookIOT, enabling scalable cloud data historian capabilities, as well as Uptake Connectors and Uptake Elevate for connectivity and integration. Uptake Lenses, a vendor-neutral object model that organizes, unifies, and contextualizes industrial data, is also offered as a supporting component of Uptake Fusion. Either in the customer's or Uptake's Azure tenant, setup and data migration are simple, per Uptake.
Empowering organizations to move industrial data from one site to many, and operational data from many sites to one, the combined offerings provide company-wide visibility into performance at the component, asset, process, plant, and enterprise levels. Once in the cloud, data is prepared for operational applications, including Uptake's Industrial AI, to assure production levels and quality, prevent unplanned downtime, and mitigate operational risk.
"Time-series data is a crucial element for realizing the benefits that AI and other digitally-driven innovation provide," noted Michael Gullifoyle, vice president, ARC Advisory Group. "Yet, asset-intensive companies struggle to access, secure, move, and manage this data in a cloud environment, and this inability severely limits their capacity for innovation. Industrial companies that can target and overcome these specific gaps, such as data portability, and the solution providers that can help them do so, demonstrate how digital transformation will move from vision to reality. ShookIOT customers Chevron, Enerplus Corp., and Ensign Drilling are examples of that possibility."
The acquisition of ShookIOT comes soon after the news of Uptake's partnership agreement with RCI to strengthen reliability-centered maintenance for asset-intensive industries.
