Multinational oil and gas company Shell, together with C3 AI, the leading provider of enterprise AI software, energy technology company Baker Hughes and Microsoft announced the launch of the Open AI Energy Initiative (OAI), a first-of-its-kind open ecosystem of artificial intelligence (AI)-based solutions for the energy and process industries.
“Digital technologies and AI are helping us improve our core business today and build the energy businesses of the future,” said Shell Chief Technology Officer Yuri Sebregts. “Over the last few years, we have been working with C3 AI to scale our AI-based predictive maintenance solutions to reduce costs and improve the productivity, reliability and performance of our assets. We are monitoring more than 5,200 pieces of equipment using machine learning across upstream and downstream manufacturing as well as integrated gas assets. We are excited to take this capability to market and want to develop an open ecosystem where others can offer AI solutions to help improve reliability across the industry.”
The OAI provides a framework for energy operators, service providers, equipment providers and independent software vendors for energy services to offer interoperable solutions, including AI and physics-based models, monitoring, diagnostics, prescriptive actions and services, powered by the BHC3 AI Suite and Microsoft Azure.
The first set of OAI solutions provided by Shell and Baker Hughes are focused on reliability and designed to improve uptime and performance of energy assets and processes.
“Taking energy forward requires new approaches to technology that leverage collaboration, open data standards, and cutting-edge AI capabilities,” added Uwem Ukpong, executive vice president of regions, alliances & enterprise sales at Baker Hughes. “Working alongside our alliance partners at C3 AI and together with industry leaders at Shell and Microsoft, the OAI will help address the persistent industry challenge of nonproductive downtime. This new ecosystem will leverage our strong existing BHC3 portfolio and is a promising step in the digital transformation of energy.”
As Kevin Prouty, IDC group vice president, energy and manufacturing insights said, the Open AI Energy Initiative is an early but clear reflection of the direction the market is heading.
