Simon is the Digital Energy Leader at Arup, Fellow of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE), and the Delivery Team Lead for the Centre for Digital Built Britain (CDBB) National Digital Twin programme. A technology developer and chartered mechanical engineer, Simon has a passion for the transformational applications of digital engineering, and regularly speaks on the subject at events around the world. He is the author of the Digital Twin Maturity Spectrum, and has received numerous awards for contributions to the engineering profession.
What are you expecting to see at Smart IoT this year?
I am expecting to see excellent developments being shared and discussions had that start to bring together the different buckets of technology into a constellation of technologies.
Which particular areas do you think are developing the most quickly and why?
The size and cost of remote sensing technology, supported by the increase in connectivity (i.e. 5G), access to storage and compute, and the pace of ‘advanced’ technology entering the consumer market (i.e. AR on mobile phone). Together these areas will help society and industry move towards realising the full benefits that can be unlocked by adopting a digital twin approach – which at the moment seem little more than a unicorn to many.
Simon Evans - Digital Energy Leader, Arup
Thinking about smart cities, where do you see opportunities for private & public sector cooperation?
For me, the biggest opportunity is in connecting multiple digital twins together, to create an ecosystem of connected digital twins (a national digital twin), which will open the opportunity to release value for society, the economy, business and the environment.
Each connected digital twin will naturally be owned by various private and public sector organisations, with the area for co-operation being working together under a common information management framework to help develop and realise the vision of such a national asset, whilst of course being security-minded.
The Centre for Digital Built Britain (CDBB), are really taking the lead on this through their National Digital Twin programme, which is excellent!
Do you see the IoT industry sector fragmenting into verticals?
Naturally we’ll always start with fragmentation, as each vertical strives to address their particular challenges and use-cases. The real benefit comes when we start to draw a commonality across the verticals, and allow that cross-sector knowledge transfer to drive the whole industry forward.
Join Simon at Smart IoT London, 11-12 March, ExCeL London
Smart IoT has compiled the biggest and best programme to date with 2 theatres, 67 speakers and 4 brand new streams of content!
