AVEVA World, the flagship event of AVEVA — a global leader in industrial software driving digital transformation and sustainability — opened on Tuesday with a call for “radical collaboration” to fully realise the promise of artificial intelligence (AI).

 

In his keynote address at the event, AVEVA CEO Caspar Herzberg urged companies, governments, and technology partners to move beyond traditional silos and embrace open ecosystems.

 

Hosted from 8 to 10 April at the Moscone West Convention Centre in San Francisco, Day One of the event featured speakers including Stanford professor Erik Brynjolfsson, Schneider Electric CEO Olivier Blum, and Archaea Energy CEO Starlee Sykes, along with other business leaders.

 

The event includes over 150 breakout sessions across 12 industries, discussing how industrial intelligence is enabling companies to analyse, visualise, and contextualise their data to improve decision-making, build resilience, and enhance sustainability across the enterprise.

 

Climate of paradox

Herzberg said the 21st century has been defined by accelerating connectivity — across information, supply chains, economies, and people — but warned that these advances are increasingly challenged by global fragmentation.

 

“We’re living in an era where connection and division are happening at the same time,” he said. “Financial markets, information systems, companies — we’re all more interdependent than ever before. And yet, we also see de-globalisation, polarisation, and increasing isolation. These twin forces are creating a new kind of complexity.”

 

In this climate of paradox, Herzberg said industry must evolve — not by clinging to outdated models, but by embracing new ways of thinking, powered by intelligent systems and deep collaboration.

 

“We can’t solve new problems with old thinking,” he said. “We need approaches that are fit for purpose.”

 

Contrary to the common mantra that industry must “do more with less,” Herzberg argued that today’s environment actually offers abundance: data, ideas, innovation, and a collective desire for progress.

 

“This isn’t the era of doing more with less — we can do more with more,” he said. “We are living in a period of explosive innovation, driven by technology. Amid these advancements, there’s a wealth of opportunity to make common cause — to do things together that we couldn’t achieve on our own, to scale rapidly, to do more.”

 

“There’s an opportunity to harness the potential of the cloud, of networks and ecosystems. The evolution of business ecosystems is the transformation imperative of today.”

 

New Aveva tools

According to Herzberg, this explosion of innovation is driving a fundamental shift in how industry operates, fuelled by technologies such as cloud computing, the Internet of Things (IoT), and particularly artificial intelligence. But he emphasised that it’s not the technologies themselves that will define success — it’s how they are used, and who uses them together.

 

To support this shift, AVEVA has launched a range of AI-powered tools, such as AVEVA Unified Engineering for generative plant design, and its Industrial AI Assistant for predictive maintenance and operations. Herzberg also highlighted the company’s Connect platform, which he described as “open, agnostic, and built for everyone.”

 

“It’s not about building walled gardens and hoarding data,” he explained. “It’s about aggregating, enriching, and analysing industrial data — and then cascading that intelligence across the ecosystem. That’s how we drive clarity, agility, and resilience.”

 

However, for such platforms to deliver transformational value, Herzberg said companies need to take bold steps. “And that’s why, back in October at AVEVA World in Paris, I introduced an idea that I call radical collaboration.”

 

Sharing knowledge

“Radical collaboration means transcending business-as-usual to connect information and insights in new ways — working across silos, across organisations, across value chains. It’s about sharing across domains, bringing a multidisciplinary approach to problems, and tapping into systems thinking. It’s about finding the signal in the noise and seeing with fresh eyes.”

 

“I call it ‘radical’ because it represents a departure — it’s not how we did things before. It means recognising that sharing information doesn’t diminish its value. On the contrary, sharing enhances it. And it’s ‘collaborative’ because it involves finding synergies throughout the operational lifecycle and with other groups — even with rivals.”

 

He described this approach as essential for solving the “higher-order” challenges facing industries worldwide, including productivity pressures, emissions reduction, and navigating supply chain volatility.

 

“These aren’t challenges any one company can solve alone,” Herzberg said. “They are common problems — and they need common solutions.”

 

He concluded: “The world needs industry — not just to deliver life’s essentials — but to lead the digital economy forward while keeping our planet liveable for future generations.” -TradeArabia News Service