Partnership to bridge OT and IT networks

Siemens and Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company, on Wednesday announced a strategic partnership focused on bridging the operational technology (OT) and information technology (IT) worlds.

Based on the complementary portfolios, Siemens and Aruba are able to support customers with highly reliable, secure and insightful data networks enabling high plant and network availability.

Customers benefit from integrated networks with proven interoperability from factory floors to corporate offices based on Siemens’ expertise as a leading provider of industrial Ethernet network components and Aruba’s as a leader in wired and wireless LAN infrastructure.

Digitalization, Industrie 4.0 and Industrial IoT are raising new challenges because now data increasingly must traverse the boundary separating IT and OT. Typically, deterministic, industrial OT networks are not coupled tightly with enterprise IT networks.

This results in gaps in data and device visibility, application assurance, availability, and security. Siemens and Aruba bridge this divide based on their deep and complementary expertise in OT and IT.

Klaus Helmrich, Member of the Management Board at Siemens AG, said the cooperation between Siemens and Aruba is an important step to complement the company's industrial networks offering.

"Industrial networks offering is one of the pillars of the Digital Enterprise, with the additional IT offering from Aruba. Customers will benefit from futureproof, integrated communication networks ensuring availability and security," said Helmrich.

Keerti Melkote, President and Co-Founder at Aruba, said Siemens and Aruba have addressed the OT/IT divide thru technology integration, backed by validated reference designs.

"The resulting solutions are ideal for a variety of industrial applications, and are backed by both Siemens’ and Aruba’s support teams," he said.

The solutions include wired and wireless networking products and related software that can be implemented via several channels including the companies’ extensive partner networks with direct access to their engineering and support experts.

Aruba and Siemens can address customer requirements spanning pre-sales consulting and engineering, professional services (including project management, commissioning, factory acceptance testing, and design engineering), managed operations and maintenance services, and after-sales support.