In fact, it is nothing special—it is merely the product of combining a series of information technologies such as Internet technology and the Global Positioning System. Yet it is also very special: its emergence is like installing a black box on every piece of construction machinery. More importantly, it means that the integration of industrialization and informatization has been put into genuine practice in construction machinery enterprises.

    If only basic performance is considered, mechanical products can even be purely mechanical, and such products seem incompatible with informatization. Therefore, before this, the topic of integrating industrialization and informatization seemed to be confined mainly to internal enterprise management. But this initiative by XCMG broke the ice between the two.

    According to XCMG, which was the first to launch this system, IoT uses the Global Positioning System (GPS), mobile communication networks, and the Internet to achieve intelligent identification, positioning, tracking, monitoring, and management of construction machinery, enabling “thing-to-thing, person-to-person, and thing-to-person connectivity” among construction machinery, operators, technical service engineers, dealers, and manufacturers across locations, remotely, dynamically, and around the clock.

    Realizing this idea is actually not difficult: it only requires installing a chip with a transmitting device in the machine and establishing a system capable of recording the performance parameters of key components. The enterprise then sets up an information collection base station and assigns dedicated personnel to monitor it and respond.

    Enterprises can even use the range of product performance parameters mapped out from prior measurements of product performance to create a safety-range database. The computer itself can then monitor whether each data point exceeds the safety range. In this way, maximum automation and informatization can be achieved.

    The most important significance of this technology is that problems are no longer solved after a fault occurs, but can be addressed when the fault occurs or even before it occurs. The enterprise's response speed to product faults will be greatly improved: before receiving user feedback, the enterprise already knows about the product fault and can quickly dispatch maintenance personnel, truly turning the enterprise's service from passive to proactive.

    Some faults may even be nipped in the bud. When a certain data point has deviated from the normal range, it means that the component has been damaged due to aging or external causes. The enterprise only needs to promptly notify the user to replace it, thereby helping the user avoid unnecessary losses and possibly avoiding greater property damage and casualties.

    Of course, the potential of IoT goes far beyond this. Enterprises can obtain data collected for special working conditions to carry out R&D of new products; they can also obtain technical parameters of products and use them as a basis for product optimization; and they can also use monitoring data on components as a basis for selecting supporting-parts suppliers…… If this technology is promoted, it will not only trigger a technological revolution in the construction machinery industry, but also break the mindset of integrating industrialization and informatization in other machinery fields connected with construction machinery. What we hope for is not merely an IoT applied within the construction machinery industry, nor merely an IoT confined to the machinery industry, but a truly human-centered informatized service network that can serve people.

    And this is precisely an important dimension of technological development———making human life better.