"GE soon began hiring US software engineers at a number of designated centers where they were segregated from the rest of the company."
That still seems to be the plan: "The San Ramon complex, home to GE Digital, now employs 1,400 people. The buildings are designed to suit the free-range working ways of software developers: open-plan floors, bench seating, whiteboards, couches for impromptu meetings, balconies overlooking the grounds and kitchen areas with snacks." There are pictures on the GE Digital site. What you don't see are workbenches with electrical products hooked up to computers. They're not doing embedded software.
This has an impact on product design. The GE Digital site says: "One million terabytes per day … that’s how much data Predix will process by 2020." They're thinking "big data", where all this stuff is shipped to the "cloud" for later analysis. The alternative would be digesting it near the source and only sending in the interesting stuff. They're going to collect gigabytes of "Bearing 22 temp 18 C", which is only important if the value is out of normal range or shows a trend.
The alternative would be some smartphone-sized device which listens to the data from your turbine or jet engine and finds the good stuff. But that wouldn't justify expensive cloud services, fees, meetings, etc. Even if it did exactly the same thing, GE couldn't collect huge fees for a smartphone-sized analysis device.
That still seems to be the plan: "The San Ramon complex, home to GE Digital, now employs 1,400 people. The buildings are designed to suit the free-range working ways of software developers: open-plan floors, bench seating, whiteboards, couches for impromptu meetings, balconies overlooking the grounds and kitchen areas with snacks." There are pictures on the GE Digital site. What you don't see are workbenches with electrical products hooked up to computers. They're not doing embedded software.
This has an impact on product design. The GE Digital site says: "One million terabytes per day … that’s how much data Predix will process by 2020." They're thinking "big data", where all this stuff is shipped to the "cloud" for later analysis. The alternative would be digesting it near the source and only sending in the interesting stuff. They're going to collect gigabytes of "Bearing 22 temp 18 C", which is only important if the value is out of normal range or shows a trend.
The alternative would be some smartphone-sized device which listens to the data from your turbine or jet engine and finds the good stuff. But that wouldn't justify expensive cloud services, fees, meetings, etc. Even if it did exactly the same thing, GE couldn't collect huge fees for a smartphone-sized analysis device.