GE and Microsoft have entered into a strategic partnership that will help industrial customers streamline their digital transformations by combining the two companies’ key cloud offerings. The partnership brings together GE Digital’s expertise in industrial data and applications with Microsoft’s enterprise cloud – allowing industrials to improve operations by putting their digital industrial systems in the cloud.

As a result, customers will be able to combine operational technology and information technology in a manner that speeds deployment of industrial applications and achieves tangible outcomes faster, ultimately fueling growth and business innovation.

GE Digital will contribute its industrial internet of things (IIoT) solutions – built upon its Predix application development platform – that ingest, store, analyze and act on data to drive greater insight. Microsoft brings its vast Azure cloud footprint.

Significantly for the Middle East, North Africa and Turkey region, Microsoft Azure has announced 54 regions across the globe, with 42 currently available. Two of the announced regions include UAE North and UAE Central. Azure regions meet a broad set of international standards and compliance requirements.

As part of the union, GE Digital plans to standardize its Predix solutions on Microsoft Azure and will deeply integrate the Predix portfolio with Azure’s native cloud capabilities, including Azure IoT and Azure Data and Analytics. The companies also will co-sell and go-to-market together.

In addition, GE will leverage Microsoft Azure across its own business for additional IT workloads and productivity tools, including internal Predix-based deployments, to drive innovation across the company.