02 Sustainable Solutions Research & Development

Cyril Perducat

Executive Vice President, IoT & Digital Offers, Schneider Electric

Digital innovation is really about solving real customer problems. To do so, you need to have an open ecosystem of technology partners, system integrators, customers, startups, and universities to accelerate and scale innovation.

Open innovation for digital transformation

Empowered by more than 8,000 research and development engineers worldwide, we bring bold ideas to life by developing connected, efficient, and sustainable products and solutions that address customers’ top digital transformation challenges.

Working together is the only way to fuel and advance digital innovation, so we’ve built an ecosystem that comprises customers, system integrators, startups, and best-in-class technology partners. Every project begins with one question: How can we solve the specific customer problem before us quickly and at scale?

With this collaborative approach, we gain speed and agility, thereby expanding our innovation playing field to deliver the new capabilities our customers need to thrive in today’s digital economy.

Highlight: Schneider Electric R&D

16,250

patents or patent applications

670

new patent assets in 2017

20+

digital services in development for 2018

5%

of sales devoted to R&D

Six digital foundations are driving our success in the digital space:

Schneider is leading the digital transformation of energy management and automation with:

One IoT-ready architecture and platform, EcoStruxure^™
Historical leadership at the edge, where operational technology and IT can converge securely to deliver fast, accurate intelligence at the edge
Digital life-cycle management, meaning that we apply IoT advancements to drive down cost and complexity across both CapEx stages (Design and Build) and OpEx stages (Operate and Maintain)
Deep domain and segment expertise, which enables us to advance digitization that connects expertise to technology in order to solve specific customer problems
A robust, active digital services portfolio, which amplifies the value we offer customers through services such as Resource Advisor to track and improve energy spend and Asset Advisor to improve asset health and performance
An open partner ecosystem, which allows us to scale and accelerate each customer’s digital journey by working with other best-in-class technology partners such as Microsoft^®, Accenture^®, Intel^®, Cisco^®, and Salesforce — as well as universities, startups, system integrators, and customers — to develop additional digital solutions quickly

Highlight: Strategic digital alliances

Microsoft^™ and Schneider create commercial IoT solutions in the areas of energy management and automation, marrying Microsoft's secure, trusted cloud capabilities and Schneider's OT domain expertise.

Schneider and Cisco develop advanced automation architectures across end-markets, merging Schneider’s operational technology leadership and Cisco’s world-class knowledge of networking and communication solutions.

With funding from the U.S. Department of Energy, Schneider and Intel research, develop, and commercialize silicon-based cyber security solutions for the electrical grid.

Schneider and Salesforce work as partners to leverage connectivity and IoT to create more engaging customer experiences.

Schneider and Accenture are working to cut digital-offer development time-to-market by 80 percent, so customers can achieve their digital transformation and gain improved efficiency, sustainability, and productivity.

2015 – 2017 Planet & Society barometer achievement

See the full results

Circular Economy

100%

of products in R&D designed with Schneider ecoDesign Way™

Satya Nadella

CEO,

Microsoft, at the 2017 Microsoft Inspire conference

It's amazing to see the solution [WaterForce SCADAfarm] that Schneider has built and what it can do for us as a society.

Co-innovating with digital alliance partners

With our network of best-in-class digital technology leaders, we co-innovate digital solutions that:

Respond effectively and quickly to market trends and customer needs
Innovate in a way that benefits the bottom line for business — not just innovation for innovation’s sake
Leverage technology advancements such as sensing, mobility, cloud, analytics, and cyber security so customers can compete in the digital economy, not simply keep up

Jean Cabanes

Managing Director, Industrial EALA Lead,

Accenture

Analytics-based insights are helping Schneider Electric to be more responsive to — or even anticipate — customer needs. New smart digital services, such as predictive maintenance, asset monitoring, and energy optimization help customer operations become more proactive and efficient.

Digital Services Factory: Speeding up innovation

Market trends are ever-changing. An accelerated development life cycle is essential for helping customers keep up in order to compete in today’s digital economy. Schneider Electric's Digital Services Factory (DSF) supported by Accenture is the answer. The DSF is a set of capabilities across several Schneider Electric teams, organized to accelerate the creation of new digital services and connected products within Schneider businesses.

DSF capitalizes on the following expertise of our IoT & Digital Offers organization:

Pervasive sensing
Cyber security
Device intelligence
Analytics
Digital services
Mission-critical control at the edge

The Aster Capital Fund

We invest in innovative startups through the Aster Capital Fund, a leading venture capital firm that specializes in the energy, mobility, and industry fields. This venture capital activity focuses on attractive innovation hubs (North America, Europe, China, and Israel) and has supported over 55 early-stage companies since its inception.

In 2017, as part of the Innovation at the Edge strategy, Aster supported the design and activation of a business incubation model to bring additional innovation and growth to Schneider Electric. This business incubation initiative allows employees to propose new ideas, setting the foundation for growth for Schneider Electric in new and critical areas.