Rockwell Automation Features in Digitally Enlightened Series with Technologies Added

Rockwell Automation today announced a short film produced by BBC StoryWorks Commercial Productions for DIGITALEUROPE that has been featured as part of a project exploring the influence digital innovation has on our health and livelihoods.

The series of documentary-style films, which highlights leading companies from a variety of industries, explores real-life stories that are bridging the skills gap, sustainably transforming our ways of working and living, and strengthening the security of the online environment.

The Rockwell Automation film introduces audiences from around the world to Marco Bosch, operations director of Sustainder, based in Emmen, in the Netherlands. Marco explains how local authorities can gain up to 90% energy savings from smart street lighting and how the unique manufacturing facility at Technologies Added enables the flexibility and mass customization required for a range of further smart-city technologies.

Alongside footage from the factory floor, Technologies Added managing director, Joris Bisschop outlines the digital technology backbone from Rockwell Automation that supports the company’s innovative approach to the factory-as-a-service model.

Rockwell Automation “Shows What is Possible”

“This project shows what is possible with digitally enabled human ingenuity,” said Mark Bottomley, Rockwell Automation regional vice president of strategic accounts and sales specialists. “Industrial digital transformation delivers better ways of living and working in a more sustainable world, and I’m extremely proud of the role Rockwell Automation is taking in helping our customers deliver positive outcomes.”

In launching the series, Cecilia Bonefeld-Dahl, director-general, DIGITALEUROPE said: “We are proud to be launching a series that brilliantly highlights the digital transformation we are seeing across Europe today. Understanding the commitment and drive that’s required by digital innovators to solve society’s challenges will increase awareness and encourage us to provide the right environment for innovation and collaboration to flourish.”

The #DigitallyEnlightened project is supported by an in-depth Rockwell Automation executive podcast, featuring both Marco Bosch and Joris Bisschop in conversation with Rockwell Automation UK CTO Mike Loughran. Their discussion explores disruptive digital transformation, its impact on business models, and, taking the examples of Sustainder and Technologies Added, its potential to support smarter, more sustainable city living.

“Our factory-as-a-service model proved instrumental in the fabrication of a new concept in smart street lighting from Sustainder,” Bisschop said. “Smart shared factories, such as ours, will soon be commonplace and will help companies bring amazing ideas to life.”

A blog post from Marco Bosch is also now available, offering a more detailed overview of the range of smart features that can be incorporated into Sustainder streetlighting to enable improved control, safety, flexibility, and management of public spaces.

Together, the #DigitallyEnlightened film, podcast and blog offer a variety of lenses through which people can examine a fascinating case study that exemplifies several aspects of digital transformation; its disruptive impact on business, its potential to change public infrastructure in a smart city, and its ability to leverage the capabilities of a flexible digital backbone.

Most importantly, the Rockwell Automation, Technologies Added, and Sustainder story offers an insight into the role that innovation and leadership play in harnessing digital technology to expand human possibility.

As Mark Bottomley concludes: “Technology doesn’t drive change in the world around us, people drive change”.