In business, sports, and life in general, everyone wants to be at the center and not on the edge. Being on the edge means you aren’t considered critical to the decisions or plays that win games, build businesses, or enhance relationships. The digitalization of the energy industry and the active employment of artificial intelligence to run operations is rapidly changing the view of the importance of being on the edge.

Nearly every piece of equipment at a well-site and industrial facility has sensors measuring activity and the status of the equipment, allowing preventive maintenance programs to ensure proper and continuous operations. The volume of data collected to be analyzed is growing exponentially, putting pressure on company information technology systems and staff.

Does all this data need to go back to the home office to be analyzed? Likely not. In many cases, local computer systems can assess the data and implement the necessary actions. The challenge is getting the data to the computer systems that produce those calculations, while ensuring the information is protected from “bad actors”. This is where edge computing, a technology that is rapidly changing remote business operations, enters the picture.

Advances in analytical software have reduced the need for companies to create their own programs to analyze internally collected data. It is critically important for businesses to keep this data and software safe from unauthorized intrusions. Equipment and software to collect and move data from the edge easily, cheaply, quickly, and safely is on the horizon. With edge computing becoming increasingly important, being on the edge may soon become the critical place to be.

For this Company Spotlight, we interviewed interviewed Hivecell’s CEO (Jeffrey Ricker), COO/CFO (Gerard Miller), and VP of Energy (John Kalfayan) about how the company is redefining edge computing. Hivecell is the Edge-as-a-Service company with easy-to-deploy, future-proofed, technology agnostic solutions, empowering companies to scale infinitely and save massive amounts of resources in their management and processing of big data. Hivecell takes compute power out of the data center and places it at the true edge, enabling companies to efficiently manage thousands of remote locations without a huge IT team and at 50 percent of the cost of traditional cloud providers. For more information on Hivecell, please visit www.hivecell.com.

Background: With the shift to software-as-a-service (SaaS) in the industry, software was no longer designed to run on a single computer but rather on multiple servers, with some applications requiring a minimum of three servers. This change led to higher adoption of cloud computing in the industry, especially for businesses with centralized operations where the cost of the cloud is easily absorbed. For a business with numerous……..…..READ MORE

Malta is a developer of grid-scale long-duration thermal energy storage solutions. The company’s technology is able to satisfy a daily or weekly load cycle by efficiently storing up to 200 hours of energy. The new capital will be used to advance the company’s commercialization strategy.

Energy Vault is the creator of renewable energy storage products. Applying conventional physics, fundamentals of gravity and potential energy, the system combines advanced material science and proprietary, machine-vision AI software that autonomously orchestrates the charging and discharging of electricity using ultra low cost composite bricks and innovative mechanical crane systems. The capital raised will be used to support execution of the Company’s growth plans as it ramps up multi-continent deployments of its innovative EVx™ platform, including fulfilling a strong pipeline of customer agreements across markets in the U.S., Middle East, Europe, and Australia.

Related Press Release: Energy Vault Announces $100 Million Series C Funding

Based in Durham, N.C., FlexGen is a leading integration services and software technology provider for energy storage solutions in the United States and globally. Since its founding in 2009, FlexGen has supported deployments of more than 1.2 GWh of energy storage systems across the U.S. and internationally for utility, microgrid, and C&I customers. The Company's proprietary software platform allows energy storage owners to deploy various power market strategies and combine storage solutions with any form of generation.

Kairos Aerospace provides large-scale, aerial monitoring of methane emissions to oil and gas operators across North America. Kairos will use the funds to expand globally, expand its workforce and instrument fleet to support its growing operations and sales, and develop the next generation of instruments that will increase sensitivity and improve the utility of Kairos data for its customers.

Related Press Release: Kairos Aerospace Secures $26 Million in Series C-1 Funding

Nanotech Energy is the world's leading manufacturer of graphene and the only producer of non-flammable, graphene-based batteries on the market. Nanotech Energy will utilize the new funds to accelerate international expansion, including the launch of its EU headquarters in Amsterdam, and to develop a new high-volume graphene battery manufacturing facility in Reno, Nevada.

Twenty20 Solutions is a global provider of automation and security technology, smart surveillance, monitoring, and access control solutions for off-grid environments. Skyhawk is a diversified technology and security company. The combination of the two companies delivers a comprehensive solution for customers' on-grid and off-grid security and access requirements across industries, including utilities, oil and gas, agriculture, education, and healthcare.

Related Press Release: Twenty20® Solutions Merges with Skyhawk

Energy Technology Musings

The View from The Edge