How mission critical industries are pivoting

In just about every industry, businesses have been forced to adapt and modify to accommodate remote working practices. 

While this is a relatively easy fix for some industries and job titles, it can be a challenge for many --especially in mission-critical industries like manufacturing, water and electric utilities.

As a result, industries need to rethink their supply chain in order to meet critical customer needs, while keeping the health of the general public in mind. In order to accomplish this, business leaders need to think about keeping people safe, taking on resilience and adaptability with purpose in order to come out stronger in the long-term. For example, GE Digital customers are in critical roles every day - not just in times of crisis. Keeping the lights on, and ensuring that goods, food, water and other resources keep moving globally remains a top priority.

Much of the immediate impact of COVID-19 to our customers has been revealed in the challenges they face specific to supply chain and demand. Consequently, GE Digital is providing mission-critical sites with secure, remote-work solutions for our customers’ operations so supply chains are not interrupted.

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Thanks to remote monitoring licenses, our manufacturing, water and electric utility customers have been able to minimize the number of on-site workers, while keeping staff connected to their most critical operational systems during the pandemic. Reducing on-site teams would have been unimaginable just a few years ago, but GE Digital solutions have been prepared to adapt to our customers’ evolving needs.

Specifically, the City of Haverhill water utility in the US normally operates with ten staff members, and now they can reduce on-site teams down to just one person by using our remote-work solution for their operations software. Factories, power stations and electrical grids across the globe are implementing the same to provide a sense of security at mission-critical industrial sites.

By remaining focused and fully engaged in supporting customers with remote managed services and deployment support during this time, mission-critical industries have been able to reimagine their supply chain to accommodate the new normal. Additionally, these new supply chain practices will not only be beneficial during this pandemic but will allow critical industries to be more nimble and resilient moving forward.

This article was contributed by Pat Byrne, CEO at GE Digital

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