Oden Technologies: Optimizing production on the factory floor

About Oden Technologies

Oden Technologies unites industrial hardware, wireless connectivity, and big data architecture into a single cloud-based platform so manufacturers can analyze and optimize their production from any device they choose.

Industries: Technology
Location: United States

Tell us your challenge. We're here to help.

Contact us

Oden Technologies moves to the Google Cloud Platform to cut the cost and complexity of its smart factory cloud platform for manufacturing analytics.

Google Cloud Platform Results:

  • Increases profitability and decreases waste with real-time data analysis
  • Cuts the number of VM instances to manage almost in half, freeing resources
  • Reduces data storage and analytics costs by 30%

Reduces virtual machine (VM) instances by 44%

Oden Technologies is using the Internet of Things (IoT) to improve the factories of today. The giant network of “things” (including people) connected to each other via the internet has the potential to reduce waste, increase efficiency, and improve safety. Oden is leading IoT innovation in manufacturing by combining wireless connectivity, big data, and cloud computing.

The use of data to improve manufacturing is practically as old as manufacturing itself. But the computerization of manufacturing has resulted in broad and rapid changes to the way data is collected and processed, as well as the sheer volume of data available. Oden’s goal is to help manufacturers tap into this data to quickly identify process trends and even warning signs of machine breakdown. Such visibility can reveal opportunities to improve manufacturing and maintenance processes that reduce waste and increase profit margins.

Oden designs and develops data collection devices that can plug into almost any kind of machine and can wirelessly transmit data with minimal complexity and setup time. Once devices are installed, the Oden technology platform processes data to give manufacturers cutting-edge analytics that are easy to comprehend. Analysis produced by the platform provides factory engineers with data points such as detailed root-cause analysis down to the second, factory-wide performance in real-time, and trend analysis.

“To serve our customers, we need a cloud platform that can scale reliably while keeping costs low, perform under heavy loads, and consistently deliver sophisticated features such as machine learning. Google Cloud Platform is way ahead in all of these areas compared to our previous cloud provider.”

Willem Sundblad, CEO and Founder, Oden Technologies

Improving cloud delivery

Oden’s previous cloud platform performed satisfactorily, but the company evaluated alternatives in search of potential reductions in cost and complexity and increases in performance. When evaluating Google Cloud Platform, Oden discovered it would require fewer virtual machine (VM) instances for equivalent performance, which would cut costs. Furthermore, Oden could gain more sophisticated data analytics and machine learning capabilities compared with its existing cloud provider.

Today, Oden runs its entire platform on Google Cloud Platform including Google Compute Engine, Google Cloud Pub/Sub, Google Cloud Bigtable, Google Stackdriver, and Google Kubernetes Engine.

“In order to serve our customers, we need a cloud platform that can scale reliably while keeping costs low, perform under heavy loads, and consistently deliver sophisticated features such as machine learning,” says Willem Sundblad, CEO and Founder at Oden Technologies. “Google Cloud Platform is way ahead in all of these areas compared to our previous cloud provider.”

Capturing tens of millions of metrics a day

Using Google Cloud Platform, Oden can help an average factory capture and store approximately 10 million metrics on a single manufacturing line every day. Metrics can include extremely granular detail, such as the amount of electricity going to machines, the amount of raw material consumed, and the volume of material produced. Sensors can also capture and transmit environmental information such as temperature, humidity, and dew point so that manufacturers can identify weather-related and seasonal impacts on production.

The updated Oden Cloud Platform uses Kubernetes Engine—powered by the open source Kubernetes system—to run application program interfaces (APIs) that capture data from Oden’s wireless devices on the factory floor. Google Cloud Pub/Sub then sends the data in real time to Google Cloud Bigtable, where data is processed using Oden’s proprietary analytics tools. Google Stackdriver supports Google Cloud Platform monitoring, logging, and diagnostics, which help Oden deliver its cloud platform with confidence.

“We migrated from our previous cloud provider to Google Cloud Platform in just one month. Our storage and data analytics costs have decreased by 30%. Cost savings like these allow us to protect customers from rising expenses, keeping us focused on bringing the best products to market.”

Willem Sundblad, CEO and Founder, Oden Technologies

Oden Technologies builds dashboards powered by Kubernetes Engine, which pull analyzed data from Google Cloud Bigtable. The dashboards provide customers with real-time visibility into their manufacturing lines. Oden Factory Cloud dashboards allow customers to delve deeper into their data to fine-tune production processes or discover the root causes of production issues.

With the previous cloud provider, Oden required 80 VM instances to run the dashboards. With Google Cloud Platform that number has been cut to 45, which dramatically reduces costs and complexity.

“We migrated from our previous cloud provider to Google Cloud Platform in just one month,” says Willem. “Further, our storage and data analytics costs have decreased by 30%. Cost savings like these allow us to protect customers from rising expenses, keeping us focused on bringing the best products possible to market.”

Faster data access; more efficient factories

With Google Cloud Platform, Oden can now deliver a complete factory analytics picture to manufacturers. In environments where thousands of variables affect the bottom line, businesses can now automatically and perpetually record machine and performance measurement. Oden Factory Cloud gives customers access to comprehensive data insights and can eliminate reliance on onsite infrastructure investments to run their own analytics.

Because manufacturers have access to live data and can analyze production data quickly, they can troubleshoot and resolve problems in minutes rather than months. Such information helps improve product quality, minimize unplanned downtime, cut costs, and improve profitability.

“With the help of Google Cloud Platform, we are helping our customers to be data-driven, which wasn’t possible before,” adds Willem. “They now understand that data is their most important asset. That allows them to be more innovative and continually improve their production processes.”

Tell us your challenge. We're here to help.

Contact us

About Oden Technologies

Oden Technologies unites industrial hardware, wireless connectivity, and big data architecture into a single cloud-based platform so manufacturers can analyze and optimize their production from any device they choose.

Industries: Technology
Location: United States