IOTech’s New Edge Central Release Delivers Comprehensive and Vendor-Neutral Edge Solutions
Enhancements to IOTech’s commercialized version of the EdgeX Foundry platform empowers businesses to leverage valuable industrial edge data, expediting time-to-market for industrial customer solutions
San Francisco, CA – March 26, 2024 – IOTech, the leader in open edge computing, today announced the general availability of Edge Central version 3.1. This release marks the first availability of its commercial product based on the third version of the Linux Foundation’s EdgeX Foundry, the world’s top open-source edge data platform. As a commercialized version of EdgeX, IOTech Edge Central™ makes it easy to create, deploy and manage edge systems, empowering businesses to roll-out transformative edge solutions without the risk of vendor lock-in.
As leaders and key contributors in the EdgeX Foundry open-source community, IOTech has been deeply involved with the evolution of the third major version of the base platform. Having undergone significant architectural advancements in previous platform updates, this version of EdgeX prioritizes improved usability and simplified configuration.
“It is fascinating to witness the ongoing evolution of EdgeX and its contribution to delivering an open-source open edge data platform to numerous industrial companies, underscoring the project’s continued success,” remarked Dave McCarthy, Research Vice President at IDC. “With IOTech’s commercialized offering, Edge Central, industrial companies gain access to crucial additional functionality and the assurance of software support.”
Enhanced features in EdgeX version 3.1 include common and simplified configuration of the EdgeX services, the loading of configuration files from a remote location via URI, and reducing the number of file formats used for EdgeX configuration. These updates collectively refine the platform’s ease of use. Security is improved with the new requirement that the EdgeX microservices authenticate via the use of tokens when running in secure mode.
In addition to providing trusted commercial-quality support for the new EdgeX Foundry technology, Edge Central provides essential value-added features that expedite the time-to-market for customer solutions. These include a sophisticated and scalable edge management capability that enables users to efficiently provision and monitor edge nodes, configure, orchestrate, monitor and update their applications, and onboard their OT devices and sensors.
Exclusive new product features introduced with Edge Central 3.1 include enhancements to the industrial OT device suite, including CANbus with J1939 extensions and extended OPC UA support. Similarly, new out-of-the-box connectivity for Azure and AWS cloud services have increased its northbound cloud-streaming capabilities. The refreshed Edge Central User Interface (UI) also significantly enhances usability with service control and management options.
“IOTech is extremely proud to have played a leading role in developing the third major version of the EdgeX Foundry platform,” said Andrew Foster, Product Director of IOTech. “The recent EdgeX 3.1 release was a stabilization release of the initial 3.0 version, which makes this the ideal time to bring the third major iteration of our commercial Edge Central product to market. IOTech customers can now deploy the latest EdgeX technology with confidence while also taking advantage of new key connectivity features developed by the IOTech team.”
Edge Central has been selected and deployed by numerous customers across many key industries, including manufacturing, industrial automation, energy, building automation and transportation.
“As industrial companies delve into exploring edge solutions, they often realize that an open architecture supported by a network of partners holds the greatest appeal. Experimenting with EdgeX promptly showcases the prowess of an open and adaptable platform,” explained Foster. “When reaching the stage where they’re prepared to advance and transition to full-scale edge application deployment and management, they turn to IOTech. Leveraging Edge Central, they receive a seamless, high-quality commercial edge solution.”
To learn more about the enhanced capabilities of Edge Central 3.1, visit www.iotechsys.com or contact us today.
About IOTech
IOTech solves the industrial data problem at the edge. Used by the leading providers and consumers of industrial edge solutions, IOTech’s edge software makes industrial data easily accessible, actionable, and manageable. Based on EdgeX, the world’s #1 open-source data integration platform, IOTech has created a flexible plug-and-play, open-edge distributed OT connectivity, data compute platform, and edge management toolset. IOTech’s edge software significantly reduces the time-to-value equation and protects edge/ industrial IoT investment beyond the IT lifecycle.
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Gavin Hunter
VP of Global Marketing, IOTech Systems