On the 17th of April Accenture organized a round table on the topic of convergence of information technology and operations technology. More than forty participants got together in the Van Nelle factory in Rotterdam, a location included in the Unesco World Heritage list.
Representatives from industries such as chemicals, oil and gas, utilities and metals expressed their appreciation for the sharing of experience, by Kristian Notebaert, Aart van Eekelen and Roel Schreij. Kristian Notebaert, COO of ArcelorMittal Gent, shared his view on the value of IT for production operations.
Then, Aart van Eekelen, site manager Functional Chemicals of AkzoNobel, shared his experience on the advantages and disadvantages of a corporate approach to IT for production operations. The final presentation was provided by Roel Schreij, senior portfolio manager of Shell, about the way Shell has successfully organized the convergence of IT and OT.
Accenture presented the results from our bench marking. The most important conclusion is that a large part of the participating companies (35 in total) need to re-organize in order to establish a governance structure that enables intensive, structure based collaboration between stakeholders such as production operations representatives, operational excellence teams, automation teams and IT teams. Only by consciously addressing the topic of IT – OT convergence companies can reap the benefits of effective IT platforms for production operations, which are essential for high performance.
Should you want to know more about the bench marking, or want to receive the related publication, then do not hesitate to contact me at: Bianca.Scholten@accenture.com.
