A Time for Industrial Superheroes: GE Digital User Conference 2020 – Day 3 Recap

I can’t believe we’ve come to the end of our 2020 User Conference. It’s been an amazing few days of learning and inspiration.

We take our responsibility to put industrial data to work seriously. What keeps us motivated every day is listening to customer feedback, and learning from all of you.  

During one of her sessions, Linda Rae, General Manager, Power Generation and Oil & Gas, shared the results of more than 100 discovery-based voice of customers sessions. What our customers told us they’re looking for included:

• Rapid, out-of-the-box value
• Help facilitating change management
• Demonstrable ROI

We want you to know we’re listening, but more critically we’re investing in the areas you’ve told us are most critical to your business.

During the session, Linda was joined by three industrial leaders who stepped us through their partnership with GE Digital and how we’re realizing these goals together. 

•       Manny Rubio – CEO, Aboitiz Power
•       Sashi Nair – Reliability Enablement Specialist, Suncor Energy
•       Joe Verbout  - Generation IT Director, Xcel Energy

Thank you all for joining us and sharing your journeys of transformation.

Later in the day, we got a tour of the GE Wind Energy plant in Shenyang, where we were stepped through the role our Manufacturing Execution System (MES) solution plays in bringing together previously disconnected systems. My favorite part of the presentation was seeing all of the TV screens around the plant which are used to bring data visualization right to the shop floor.

It was great to experience Whirlpool’s $200 million dishwasher factory and how they are leveraging our Digital Plant solutions to optimize production and efficiency. Thank you for the tour: Sam Chen MSD Supervisor, Whirlpool (China) Co., LTD, XiaoMei Fan Dishwasher Factory IT Department Manager, Whirlpool (China) Co., LTD, Mingjie Zhang Professional Services, GE Digital and Ray Zhang Dishwasher Factory Manager, Whirlpool (China) Co., LTD.

PETRONAS’ Firdaus Hasani, Senior Manager, System and Work Process Tools, shared their journey to operational excellence. With the newly installed Asset Performance Management (APM) system 34,500 areas of risk were identified, and more critically it surfaced 36,300 recommended actions. The team now feels empowered and inspired for what is possible in the future.

Dan Summerlin, Principal Consultant at Teradata took us away from the shop floor and into the customer’s experience. He reminded us that customer experience means optimizing each touchpoint at every interaction with every customer at every channel over the life of the relationship. Teradata and GE Aviation’s Digital Group partner to deliver four critical capabilities:

• Access to data
• Ability to analyze data (i.e. sentiment analysis, micro-segmentation)
• Opportunity to act (location based messaging)
• Ability to learn

Throughout the conference we have shared dozens of presentations. We mapped out our vision for the future, we showcased technology innovations, and best of all we shared our customer’s digital transformation stories. We hope you’ll visit the conference highlights and on-demand content to catch up on any sessions you may have missed or want to share with others.

Until next time industrial superheroes!