Development of a cloud-based IoT platform

The OSDi platform includes both the purchase of individual software products as well as in-house developments. The aim is to combine all these components under one roof on the Internet, offering added value for existing and future customers. The platform is not only designed to support Fette Compacting machines, but also allows for easy integration of other manufacturers' assets. Specifically, this means that a machine – in this case, the “thing” in IoT – sends live status data to the cloud, and the new platform stores this data efficiently and makes it available for analysis and diagnostics. It is intended to allow the subsequent implementation of additional functions, such as performance management and predictive maintenance, which involves analyzing all the process and machine data collected.

The interdisciplinary team consisted of UI designers, UX specialists and cloud-native developers from codecentric and UX&I as well as digital solutions experts from Fette Compacting. Ideas, approaches, possible existing and new applications for the future platform were brainstormed and then discussed.

The result was a user story map that precisely describes the business domain and covers all product features.

It quickly became clear during the workshop that codecentric AG, together with UX&I, is a suitable implementation partner for the impending task. In addition to the actual development of the IoT platform, the main goal of the planned collaboration was to enable Fette Compacting's in-house engineering team to continue to develop the new platform independently and to operate it successfully in the cloud. As is usual for codecentric, this was to be achieved through close collaboration, involving the customer in all areas of development, as well as in the architecture and design of the platform to be developed.

A possible infrastructure in the AWS Cloud was proposed in the PoC implementation with AWS Professional Services. The results were supplemented by further requirements, with the following key infrastructure requirements emerging:

Highest standards of security and compliance

• Exact user management
• Principle of least privilege (PoLP) for all services
• Implementation and enforcement of company policies on security, audits, and compliance

Use of fully managed services

• Low "running" costs
• Reduced administrative effort

Serverless architecture

• Low "running" costs
• No non-stop instances
• Automatic scaling of all resources

To achieve these requirements, some of the previous approaches taken by AWS Professional Services were revised and implemented using the following core services from the AWS portfolio:

• AWS Organizations
• AWS CDK (Cloud Development Kit)
• AWS Amplify
• AWS IoT Greengrass
• AWS Appsync

The AWS Greengrass-based IoT solution is able to efficiently manage customer assets on all continents. The web application makes it easy to set up and manage machines transparently. The only manual step currently required is the transfer of security certificates and the connection/linking of assets to the cloud. The data for this is stored and processed internally in a geographically nearby region. Data queries, such as those for the various dashboard elements, can therefore be performed highly efficiently.

The project was implemented in cooperation with the customer over a four-month development phase. Further development and perfective maintenance of the OSDi platform is being driven forward internally by Fette Compacting. Two key decisions in particular ensured the speed and success of the implementation:

1. TypeScript was chosen as the programming language. This decision enables the use of the same programming language, paradigms, and libraries from the definition of the infrastructure (Infrastructure as Code) to the Lambda functions executed at the machine on the edge device, and on to the web application.
2. AWS was chosen as the cloud provider. This made it possible to build on a wide range of existing and managed services, which could be used to meet all project requirements. This involved combining existing and proven services with the Fette Compacting OSDi platform's own business logic.

Fette Compacting's newly developed OSDi platform is currently being tested with both customer-supplied machines and Fette Compacting's own machines from the global (Technology)CompetenceCenters. The customer feedback has been very positive and the application is being further developed.

The use case described here shows that there are no technical hurdles for industrial companies to creating an IoT platform. Complete and customized platform solutions can be built faster than ever with the help of sophisticated cloud services and software tools. All it takes is creativity and imagination to consider such innovative ideas.