The Bosch Connected World event in Berlin is an industry invitation-only gathering. It’s fast-becoming a sought-after Internet of Things (IoT) prediction machine and this year’s proved no different with the announcement of Bosch’s IoT private cloud solution. Kit Fordson spoke with Dr Rainer Kallenbach, the Chairman of the Executive Board of Bosch Software Innovations, to get more insight.
just-auto: You’ve launched your IoT cloud today. I understand there’s only going to be a single data centre in Stuttgart.
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Dr Rainer Kallenbach: We don’t disclose the details obviously. There are concepts for all kinds of physical redundancies you’ve got in any professional computer centre. From the outside it looks like we’ve got one instance, but this is fairly standard.
j-a: So there’s not necessarily going to be one data centre…
RK: We can’t disclose how it’s done. Bosch has been running its corporate IT from day one since it’s been using its digital equipment on workplaces on our own premises. So it’s a network around the world, which we run ourselves, spanning also across the continents, so wherever there is a Bosch location we too have some access to our data centres. So there’s a complete set of data centres, we have 3,000 people connected to a network of data centres.
j-a: So you already have the infrastructure in place?
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By GlobalDataRK: We already have most of the infrastructure. By Moore’s Law, traditional IT gets more and more compact. You don’t need huge spaces for having computing powers, so you don’t need the football fields. What we are doing currently and for our applications we don’t need that and we can do it with our existing infrastructure.
j-a: Does that mean you’re more selective about the data that you’re going to store/process/analyse?
RK: We are selective with respect to other questions, but not for sizing our storage.
j-a: One data centre sounds like there’s a single-point-of-failure vulnerability…
RK: That is something we very much do not have. This is elementary IT and we know how to avoid this. We have this implemented. The guy from the German Insurance company, he said he had been there and it is better than what he’d seen elsewhere.
j-a: Looking at environment, Germany has a reputation for being environmentally sensitive. What measures have you taken to address the power and other environmental concerns associated with cloud computing, whether initially or in the future?
RK: In a previous role, I was responsible for running the IT network in Bosch. The concept of Green IT has been implemented and it is costly, affecting servers and climate systems but a lot of this also relies on how you purchase your energy. I am not a specialist in this, but this is cared for. By the way, it’s from all I see and know, it’s much more efficient to run things in the cloud, CO2 wise it’s better.
j-a: Cost is one of the big reasons other companies would not bring their cloud services in-house. They would tend to use Amazon Web Services (AWS) or MS Azure – more cost-effective platforms. One might suggest it’s going against the grain to bring cloud services in-house. How would you respond?
RK: I would not discuss it as either/or. The big public clouds still exist. Not every tool fits every task. We are sure in the IoT environment, we have tasks that we can better solve with a dedicated IoT cloud. Certainly much smaller in size than the large public clouds. It does not necessarily exclude this. In an example, where we stream Spotify, we are not hosting the music on our cloud. Our customers’ data – sensitive data – we can keep in our cloud.
j-a: So you’re taking the responsibility and the expense in-house?
RK: Yes.
j-a: When is the profit/revenue stream going to come from?
RK: Please don’t believe that we are selling the cloud as an infrastructure-based solution.
j-a: Not yet…
RK: No, we will most likely not do this at all. If you need cheap storage, or computing power, you can go everywhere in the market. We would not invest in something that is there. If you want to run a sensitive application, with sensitive data, with lots of domain-specific requirements, you will find that probably the large public clouds are not the answer to that. And then we have an attractive offer and usually this involves platform, what we call Bosch IoT Suite, a collection of microservices that helps you to build your application fast. And it includes probably some pre-developed applications that you use, make a nice interface and you can run it. Our ability is not selling the cloud itself only but the expertise from the embedded systems. You have seen the HUK-Insurance example there for electronics, sensors. As Bosch group we have the ability to do end-to-end solutions. We don’t do it in all cases. In some cases, the customer does end-to-end and we provide only parts, but we have end-to-end understanding and ability and that makes the difference.
j-a: And do you think that will provide the necessary product differentiation for you to maintain market share?
RK: We don’t differentiate by the cloud technology itself, but the added value services and knowhow that we offer to the customer. The higher you go in these levels – these three levels of Infrastructure-as-a-service (IAAS), Platform-as-a-service (PAAS) – there we already substantial knowhow coming from the embedded world and in security and finally Software-as-a-service (SAAS). This is where we generate value for the customer [through applications] and that is eventually the business.
j-a: In the application layer, is it not going to be the most vulnerable because you’ll have to work with the public cloud and put your own cloud at risk?
RK: Well, yes.
j-a: What kind of measures will you be taking to mitigate against attacks?
RK: If you look at the application layer, it is probably a little bit more critical. It might use data from other clouds. There are choices and this, by the way, is about having a deep understanding in the Bosch group and bringing in our specialist knowledge from the embedded world, electronics and so on. We also want to make sure we have choices and that our customers have choices. We think what we are offering has special characteristics that are attractive for IoT solutions. We wouldn’t host music or Facebook. But if it’s your heating system or your car or energy or industry, [we would]
One of the specialities of Bosch is working in four different domains – home, automotive, industrial equipment and energy business. We are in the consumer business with the home equipment and power tools and these are four very different sectors, business models, rules, branches. We are the only company of our size that has these four pillars and what we really try to do is put one common technology also in the cloud as we see the connectivity it always starts within one domain. You can connect your car to the cloud, you do this through a special app, a special domain, you connect home, energy. What we say, and Dr Denner gave this as a nice example, we have interconnectivity between the domains, i.e. connecting car and home or home and energy, or energy and cars. Energy is one of the decisive cost factors in manufacturing and you can connect these two. And by the way, with all four of these domains, we do smart city applications as well. And we believe that this must be one technology, one platform, one specialism but there will be a joint core so each can talk to each other and this is something we are very actively promoting. That is one of my core jobs on the technology standards.
j-a : On the technology side, are you trying to create a common standard?
RK: Now we really believe you can’t win the IoT game by market dominance. This will not happen. We will not be able to supply every device or technology. No company can do that. IoT is so complex. You need not just the sensors – yes, that’s an interesting part of it – but you also need the database technology and the communication technology to connect the things wirelessly.
j-a: So you win by collaboration?
RK: You NEED collaboration across different technology segments and this means as it’s such a wide span now you cannot do fixed contracts. The one sensor, with that one software, with that one connectivity platform and that one database guy. What is happening is you create a large marketplace – in the cloud, by the way – and these microservices. Everything is there, you just choose “Combine” and you pay for it as a service. Then you have a living ecosystem, choosing the best one for your purpose. That includes the concept of having alternatives, even on the same level, like a non-Bosch product. And depending on your purpose you take A, B or C, even if C is not Bosch. They should be all in the cloud and I have a choice. For the one project, A is better than B and C, the next might take C. It is not a question of [one company] versus another. It will not be the rule of the game and the same thing is happening on every layer of the subset [of the IoT structure].
j-a: So you will technically support non-Bosch products in the future?
RK: Yes, we are promoting open standards. We are quite sure that having joint standards and building these ecosystems is good for everybody. IoT will work only if you have this interoperability. You have probably no smart home and what you can get today is isolated solutions, so you’re on an island and if you buy the solution from Manufacturer A you can only connect the devices he has listed. That is usually limited and if you look at the variety of devices you have in your home you don’t want to be limited. So we are working actively to create open standards and interoperability standards. Networking in the car, for example, was a similar thing. You have engine, brakes – all isolated electronics systems. How do you bring them together? Car makers had their own connectivity standards – buses. It was tremendous work and a nightmare for the technicians to connect the system. Bosch was very active to create a standard for the hardware connectivity – this was the CANBUS and we co-created with some semiconductor partners, including Intel. Another proprietary solution, you can connect Bosch devices, but everyone can use it. So that’s the same way we promote now the standards with partners. Many of them are created in open source communities where we are very active – Eclipse, or ICC, Industrie 4.0 – and this is our role, to try to drive this. We know other companies try to play the game by themselves, with closed standards and proprietary solutions that don’t let anybody in, or “I want to tie everybody in”.
j-a: Will there be integration with Amazon Echo and Google Works-type smart hubs?
RK: I cannot say yes or no. We are open towards connectivity with every reasonable architectural solutions but we have to find a way. These very complex solutions are built from the ground up and happening in steps. The last two years [at the Bosch Connected World event] we have seen incredible technological progress. Two years ago, no one spoke at all about clouds and now we have one. Things are developing dynamically so I don’t know what we will presenting in the next two years….but obviously stay tuned!
It’s happening now, these ecosystems are being created and we are offering within these ecosystems a very attractive solution and practical ability to organise things you can see.
j-a: To bring it back to automotive, there are growing numbers of ECUs leading to increasing security concerns. How is Bosch addressing this?
RK: We have seen much easier than others that security in connected car systems is going to be a topic. We have started to develop technologies and build up a very powerful Centre of Competence. It started with corporate research, today everyone in our automotive team and some non-auto technicians [have acquired the competence]. We acquired Escrypt, specialists in encryption – with speciality encryption you can have an IT sector at many locations, but Escrypt are able to do it in embedded systems. We are using their technology in the Bosch IoT cloud and in the IoT suite. Of course, if you want to have security in IoT applications you need to make end-to-end security over the device, into the cloud and further ongoing to all connected devices, whether it’s a smartphone or an enterprise system of a company sending bills and other commercial data. To have to make adequate security. That also gives you an idea of why the person from the insurance company [HUK] mentioned that what he has seen at our site, from a security level, is much more than he’s seen elsewhere.
j-a: Finally, how do you see the future for security and privacy?
There is a technical level of security and everybody understands this is for IT more or less, so state-of-the-art technology always has limitations, therefore we say it’s never absolutely secure. But it’s at least a “state-of-the-art” level. Then you have something in connected devices, that is where we have some edge. We have data security in the sense of privacy protection. If we handle personal protection. This device [smartphone] knows everything about me – it knows my religion, my beliefs, my political convictions, everything – calculated with correlation on Big Data, but I can switch it off. Many devices will do the same in the future but you cannot switch it off, so therefore it’s very important that you protect personal and sensitive data. And that’s not a technology question, that’s a question of ethics – how to organise it – and of legal systems.
