CRN's 2019 IoT Innovators Awards
CRN honors top solution providers leading the charge in bringing unique and innovative Internet of Things solutions to enterprises, SMBs and industrial companies.
The 2019 IoT Innovators Awards
Smart schools that give students new ways to learn. Bicycle races that track racers with sensors. Smart harvesters that can determine whether a vegetable is ripe.
These are just a few of the IoT solutions coming from top solution providers who have expanded beyond their foundational competencies in IT and operational technology to pursue a field that has become increasingly important in digital transformation strategies.
For the 2019 IoT Innovators Awards, CRN is honoring these solution providers whose offerings range from condition-based maintenance and vehicle tracking to virtual medicine and smart buildings. Take a look at this year's IoT Innovators in the following slides.
And you can hear more from some of these solution providers at CRN parent The Channel Company’s IoT Connex virtual event on October 23 and on demand thereafter.
Allied Reliability
Top Executive: Jay Burnette, CEO, President
Allied Reliability is a leader in condition-based maintenance solutions thanks to its SmartCBM solution for manufacturing and industrial companies.
The Houston, Texas-based company's SmartCBM solution uses condition monitoring for early detection of component defects as well as to prevent unplanned downtime and lower maintenance costs. One customer, Cooper Tires, said it was able to steadily increase its overall equipment effectiveness.
Altaworx
Top Executive: Rickie Richey, CEO
As an AT&T partner, Altaworx provides a variety of IoT solutions, including AT&T Control Center Managed Services, IoT connectivity, and fleet and asset tracking.
To help reseller partners better manage IoT data usage, the Fairhope, Ala.-based solution provider has developed a proprietary algorithm that bills AT&T and Verizon subscribers based on how much data each of their devices use, preventing them from paying too much or too little for a data plan.
Alvarez Technology Group
Top Executive: Luis Alvarez, CEO, President
Alvarez Technology Group is tackling smart infrastructure through its partnership with KMC, most recently with a smart agriculture project at Matsui Nursery in California.
The Salinas, Calif.-based solution provider is using the KMC Commander IoT and automation platform to easily connect sensors for temperature, humidity and water flow to better track the health of the nursery's plants and make adjustments when needed.
Aquitas Solutions
Top Executive: Wayne Brisson, CEO, Founder
Aquitas Solutions is a PTC ThingWorx and IBM Maximo partner that provides enterprise asset management and connected maintenance solutions for asset-intensive industries.
The Roswell, Ga.-based solution provider has expanded its connect maintenance solutions to include cycle-based maintenance, which automatically generates alerts and creates work orders when the cycle of an asset, such as a bander, reaches a certain threshold. Other use cases developed for customers include PLC (programmable logic controller) monitoring for hydraulic systems and pressure monitoring for air filters.
CB Technologies
Top Executive: Kelly Ireland, CEO, Founder
CB Technologies is building itself into an industrial IoT player by bridging the gap between information technologies and operational technologies, thanks in part to partnerships with vendors like PTC, RealWear, National Instruments and SparkCognition.
Through a partnership with Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Aruba Networks, the Orange, Calif.-based company has been the lead system integrator for Texmark Chemical's connected refinery project. The company, whose capabilities include predictive maintenance and digital twin, is also working on other large-scale IoT projects with Fortune 50 energy companies as well as those in Saudi Arabia.
Consiliant Technologies
Top Executive: Dave Cerniglia, CEO, Founder
As a Hitachi Vantara partner, Consiliant Technologies provides intelligent edge solutions for public safety, smart city and smart building applications
Using products like Hitachi Video Analytics, the Irvine, Calif.-based solution provider can offer a single pane of glass for a customer's entire video infrastructure that ties in data from multiple sources, such as gunshot detectors, facial recognition systems and license plate readers. This can help organizations, for instance, detect if an intruder enters a certain area and then track their whereabouts.
CVE Technologies
Top Executive: John Lee, Vice President, Division Manager
As the system integration arm of electrical contractor Cache Valley Electric, CVE Technologies stands out in the IoT channel space with its ability to provide everything from consulting and physical installation to the integration of hardware and applications.
The Salt Lake City-based solution provider offers solutions for things like predictive maintenance in manufacturing environments as well as pedestrian safety in transportation, handling everything from edge servers and sensors to wireless and wired infrastructure.
Datasmith Network Solutions
Top Executive: Paul Smith, President, Owner
Datasmith Network Solutions is building a fledgling business in IoT by providing solutions for video surveillance and video analytics.
One of the Walpole, Mass.-based company's projects involves using cameras at a multi-location coffee shop business to capture demographic information for marketing purposes. Another project, in the meantime, centers around a restaurant using video analytics to understand how the space is used.
Encon Mechanical
Top Executive: David Indursky, President, Owner
With more than 50 years of operational technology expertise, Encon Mechanical has found big opportunities in the IoT space through building automation.
One of its flagship projects is a smart building deployment at Stuart Country Day School in Princeton, N.J., where the Ocean, N.J.-based company used a KMC Controls system and KMC's IoT building automation platform, KMC Commander, to not only reduce energy consumption and improve operations but to also create an interactive learning lab for its students.
GrayMatter
Top Executive: James Gillespie, CEO, Founder
As a top GE Digital partner, GrayMatter is a trailblazer in the industrial IoT space, providing custom and collaborative solutions through its investigative data platform to manufacturing companies such as Smucker's, Komatsu and Procter & Gamble.
The Warrendale, Pa.-based company co-develops solutions with industrial customers to reduce product overfill, improve equipment reliability through predictive analytics and optimize production capacity to avoid costly capital expenditures.
Insight
Top Executive: Ken Lamneck, CEO, President
Insight is taking an industry-agnostic approach to IoT with its fully managed Insight Connected Suite solution that comes with analytics, data management, connectivity and notification capabilities.
For instance, the Tempe, Ariz.-based solution provider's Safe Spaces solution serves as the basis of a building safety platform developed with BeSafe Technologies and Microsoft for schools in Houston, Texas. This platform combines school security systems and building blueprints with IoT endpoints to activate safety mechanisms like sound sensors and color-coded LED lighting in the case of emergencies.
Kalypso
Top Executive: George Young, CEO, Founding Partner
Kalypso is applying its technical consulting chops to industrial IoT, helping customers such as a global auto parts manufacturer connect their factory operations and collect data in real time for better decision-making and transparency.
In the case of the global auto parts manufacturer, the Beachwood, Ohio-based solution provider used an IoT platform to implement a smart, connected operations solution that collects data from machines in real time and then integrates that data with enterprise software systems.
By giving executives the ability to easily view key performance indicators through live dashboards, the company has been able to improve resource allocation, capacity planning, overall equipment effectiveness and on-time delivery.
Logicalis
Top Executive: Vince DeLuca, CEO, Logicalis US
Logicalis is at the forefront of IoT, artificial intelligence and analytics solutions for manufacturing, smart cities, healthcare, retail, agriculture and education.
The New York-based solution provider has created a simple framework for identifying endpoints that need to be connected and which platforms are best for facilitating the capture, control and management of that endpoint data. The solution provider has used this framework to develop solutions for smart and connected roadways, machine vision and asset management, among other things.
Netsync Network Solutions
Top Executive: Diane Gonzales, CEO, President, Founder
Network Solutions Provider sees enough opportunity in the IoT space that it is in the midst of spinning out its IoT practice as a new company. CEO Phillip Walker plans to launch Creaxion Technologies, building out design and engineering teams as well as a DevOps team to build on platforms and integrate with other solutions out there.
One of its first offerings will focus on a computer vision solution dubbed CX Vision.
CX Vision will integrate with existing camera systems to capture demographic, behavioral and foot traffic information, which can be used for audience engagement purposes.
Network Solutions Provider
Top Executive: Phillip Walker, CEO
Network Solutions Provider sees enough opportunity in the IoT space that it is in the midst of spinning out its IoT practice as a new company. CEO Phillip Walker plans to launch Creaxion Technologies, building out design and engineering teams as well as a DevOps team to build on platforms and integrate with other solutions out there.
One of its first offerings will focus on a computer vision solution dubbed CX Vision.
CX Vision will integrate with existing camera systems to capture demographic, behavioral and foot traffic information, which can be used for audience engagement purposes.
New Signature
Top Executive: Jeff Tench, CEO
As a top Microsoft partner, New Signature is using its system integration chops to build IoT solutions, in one case helping a manufacturer of safety equipment transform a product into a connected experience.
On the agriculture side, the Washington, D.C.-based solution provider implemented Microsoft's FarmBeats technology to help a grower of household and ornamental plants monitor the early growing stages of their specimens. This has given the grower the ability to fine-tune adjustments for water, soil nutrients, sunlight and humidity while saving money and reducing waste as a result.
Novacoast
Top Executive: Paul Anderson, CEO
Novacoast is expanding its IT security expertise to the world of IoT, helping customers secure the expanding number of connected devices entering the workplace.
The Santa Barbara, Calif.-based solution provider offers comprehensive IoT discovery, segmentation and automation services to help customers build advanced workflows and policies around connected devices. This includes full-stack penetration testing for IoT devices as well as processes for ensuring the trustworthiness of code in IoT products and mobile devices.
NTT
Top Executive: Jason Goodall, CEO
NTT, the system integrator formerly known as Dimension Data, is thinking big with IoT, as evidenced by the company's connected experience work on the annual Tour de France.
In this year's Tour de France, the solution provider equipped every rider with sensors underneath their saddles, feeding real-time data on speed and GPS location through a moving mesh network to the NTT Cloud. NTT then used the data to produce real-time insights on things such individual performance and team tactics while also leveraging machine learning for live race predictions.
Onica
Top Executive: Stephen Garden, CEO
A top Amazon Web Services partner, Onica is building an IoT practice around IoTanium, the company's collection of hardware, software accelerators and analytics that can help customers quickly prototype and accelerate development of connected products.
The Santa Monica, Calif.-based cloud consulting firm's IoT practice, led by CTO Tolga Tarhan, has worked with vehicle intelligence company Spireon to create a serverless IoT platform on AWS, allowing the company to remotely provision, manage and control millions of devices. Onica also helped Spireon enabled faster data processing and real-time alerting.
OnLogic
Top Executive: Lisa Groeneveld, Co-Founder and Chair of the Board
OnLogic, most recently known as Logic Supply, fuels IoT innovation through its industrial and embedded computers that are designed for harsh and extreme environments.
The South Burlington, Vt.-based company's edge devices are used across various verticals, including smart agriculture, where one customer has equipped its smart harvesters with OnLogic computers to process visual data that is used to determine the ripeness of fruits and vegetables.
Patti Engineering
Top Executive: Sam Hoff, CEO, President, Founder
Patti Engineering is taking advantage of its operational technology expertise to build out an industrial IoT practice that utilizes the Siemens MindSphere IoT platform.
The Auburn Hills, Mich.-based company has developed its own MindSphere application with an internal software development team, for example, to predict tool wear and optimize overall equipment effectiveness for CNC machines. The company is also working on an application to help breweries monitor beer fermentation and compare the data to previous batches.
Rattle Tech
Top Executive: Wilfred Martis, CEO, Co-Founder
Led by a former Intel general manager, Rattle Tech is riding the IoT wave with custom application development services to provide transportation, logistics and smart building solutions.
For example, the Altadena, Calif.-based company has developed a vehicle tracking solution that allows delivery organizations to track the location of their vehicles and who's driving them using a USB Bluetooth beacon installed in the cabin of each vehicle. The company is also developing a package tracking feature that uses battery-powered Bluetooth beacons.
Sirius
Top Executive: Joe Mertens, CEO, President
Sirius is tackling IoT with a full-service program that includes planning and consulting, software development, infrastructure integration, managing and monitoring as well as sensor integration.
The San Antonio, Texas-based solution provider has been collecting client wins in healthcare, transportation, product development, government and manufacturing by helping them improve business operations, reduce costs and create new revenue streams.
TSP
Top Executive: Michael Oh, President, Founder
TSP is spearheading the smart home space with its own practice after more than two decades of providing integration and managed services for AV and IT solutions.
The Cambridge, Mass.-based company most recently worked on a 71-unit apartment complex as the sole supplier and installer of smart home equipment. The complex's smart home features include Lutron lighting control, Savant temperature control and integration with Amazon Alexa.
Wachter
Top Executive: Brian Sloan, CEO
Watchter combines its IT and operational technology chops to provide a variety of IoT solutions, ranging from traffic pattern measurement and predictive maintenance to motion detection and geofencing.
The Lenexa, Kansas-based solution provider most recently developed a "Restaurant of the Future" concept that uses a variety of technologies to prevent loss prevention, monitor customer traffic inside the store and in the drive-thru and enhance security inside and outside of the building's perimeter.
World Wide Technology
Top Executive: Jim Kavanaugh, CEO
World Wide Technology is making big moves in the IoT space, providing services that range from the evaluation and design of solutions to their implementation and operation.
The St. Louis-based solution provider, for instance, developed a virtual medicine solution for a large midwestern healthcare system that allows the organization to deliver remote care to their patients. An important part of the solution includes an IoT platform that analyzes data from sensors in hospitals, remote clinics and patients' homes to deliver new insights.