Envision manages Internet of Things projects on Azure

Envision was founded in 2007 to design and manufacture wind turbines. At the time, managing and generating wind energy was regarded as complex, tedious, and at the mercy of the weather.

CEO Zhang Lei decided to go digital to meet commitments made to customers. Its wind turbines had up to 500 sensors each, allowing the company to gather data about how they were running, how well they generated electricity, what kind of maintenance they required, and more.

Source: Microsoft. By monitoring factors like wind speed and direction and making real-time adjustments to wind turbines, wind farms can increase production by as much as 15%.

By monitoring factors like wind speed and direction—and making real-time adjustments to wind turbines, like changing the pitch of the blades—Envision found that wind farms could increase production by as much as 15%.

Envision also modelled wind speed and overall situational intelligence. The company was able to manage, monitor and forecast for their clients. “Digital twins” of its turbine models were later created, allowing the company to run accurate simulations.

Today, Envision's experience with wind energy has led it to combine the Internet of Things (IoT), big data, artificial intelligence (AI), machine learning, and the Azure cloud to unlock the potential contained in the IoT. Envision’s IoT operating system EnOS can connect just about anything, such as sensors, power grids, consumers, or electric vehicles. 

EnOS runs on the Microsoft Azure cloud. This helps Envision to spin up apps quickly. Being on Azure also lets Envision to hire fewer people on the infrastructure side and more on the application side, where it can offer greater value.

With AI, Envision can offer the modelling of systems as a service to its customers. One such customer is Germany-based Sonnen, which produces a high-tech electricity storage battery intended for home use. Sonnen provides the hardware and Envision, via EnOS, the device connectivity, data processing, API and operation services. 

Envision allowed Sonnen to improve its business model and resulted in a 60% reduction in development as well as operations and maintenance cost.

Envision is also collaborating with Keppel Urban Solutions, focusing on digital initiatives such as smart command centre that allows Keppel to manage energy efficiency and other key performance parameters on their aggregated digital platform.

This helps Keppel to understand what’s happening in its buildings and districts in real-time, with data displayed for heating and cooling, lighting, water and drainage and even charging stations for electric vehicles in the carparks.

“Our deep expertise in intelligent IoT is helping us drive our customer’s business transformation,” said Zhang.