Show Notes
Vladimir Romanov joins Phil Seboa to break down what it truly takes to shift legacy manufacturing systems into modern, data-driven operations. Bringing stories from the plant floor and insight from his time at ProveIt, Vlad reflects on the messy reality of automation upgrades, extracting meaningful data, and managing challenging change on both technical and human fronts. The episode. brought to you by our friends at Inductive Automation, goes beyond software hype, revealing the tough questions around ROI, assessing what to modernize, how to contextualize process data, and why education and buy-in matter more than the flashiest technology. Expect candid anecdotes, actionable strategies for bridging OT and IT, and a thought-provoking look at what actually works when pushing the boundaries of industrial automation.
About Our Episode Sponsor: Inductive Automation: By cross-pollinating IT with SCADA technologies, Inductive Automation created Ignition software, the first universal industrial application platform with unlimited potential. Ignition empowers industrial organizations to swiftly turn great ideas into reality by removing technological and economic obstacles.Ignition brings affordable Digital Transformation to your industrial operations. For the low cost of one server license, you can connect all your devices, collect more data than ever, create an unlimited number of tags, and add as many users as you need — no extra charges or hidden fees. Plus, the Ignition Designer helps you build any custom application and instantly web-deploy it to any industrial display or mobile device.Try Ignition today with a free 2-hour trial that you can reset an unlimited number of times.
Download Ignition Free Trial at: https://go.industrysagemedia.com/ignition
Visit Inductive Automation: https://www.inductiveautomation.com
------- Connect with Vladimir on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/vladromanov/ Connect with Phil on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/phil-seboa/ Connect with Ed on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ed-fuentes-2046121a/ About Industry Sage Media: Industry Sage Media is your backstage pass to industry experts and the conversations that are shaping the future of the manufacturing industry. Learn more at: http://www.industrysagemedia.com
More from Unplugged: An IIoT Podcast
This episode is brought to you by Canary Labs, and Cirrus Link Solutions.
This episode is brought to you by Cirrus Link Solutions and Canary Labs. Cirrus Link: https://unpluggediiot.com/go/cirrus-link Canary Labs: https://unpluggediiot.com/go/canary-labs
Phil Seboa and Ed Fuentes sit down with David Ariens (Analytics For Industry / AVEVA) and Willem van Lammeren (Syensqo) to explore why IT/OT convergence fails — and what organisations actually get right when convergence works.
What changes when the assets you operate stop being centralised and predictable, and start being distributed, intermittent and weather-dependent? The old operations playbook breaks — and most digital programmes are still designed for the old one. Dr Hema Wadhwa, Associate, Data & Analytics | Asset Management and Performance at Aurecon, joins Phil Seboa and Ed Fuentes to talk about building digital asset intelligence for the energy transition. Hema's career is a live map of that transition: she started as a Floating Systems Engineer in global oil and gas, moved through subsea engineering and power generation operations, and now leads digital strategy and analytics for mixed energy asset fleets. Key topics in this episode: - The unplanned career arc — floating production systems and subsea engineering into renewable operations - "Are you here to take my job?" — what digital transformation actually feels like from inside the control room - Why the solution providers have to evolve, not the operators - One gas turbine versus a hundred wind turbines: why renewable fleets break the old operations model - No standard across vendor SCADA screens and UIs, and what that inconsistency costs - Why there is no AI magic without the data groundwork first — and why selling it that way isn't ethical - Cognitive load: lean frontline teams, PDF report fatigue, and tools that land as a burden - OT/IT convergence and the cybersecurity questions that come with opening it up - OEM warranties and whether asset owners really have access to their own asset data - Recording data when it changes, not on a fixed scan rate - One source of truth, different views per role — data presented so it guides a decision - Predicting failures months ahead: cranes, spares, and turning downtime into planned work - BESS as a trading platform, not just another renewable asset - Why the real cost driver is people, and why it only stacks up if it scales across assets