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embedded Systems Elektronik International 2020 11 What role does AI play in Advantech strategy? In past years we tended to concentrate on our IoT business But last year we realized that with AI we can also boost and expand our IoT business So we commenced to invest much in the development of our AIoT artificial intelligence of things products AIoT is very popular in Asia especially China and Taiwan European development of AIoT is only beginning but will also grow in importance With IoT applications a developer may be able to collect data but it doesnt give a company a ready product that it can sell Thats what makes AIoT so important How do you support customers wanting to implement AI in their products? If there are no apps on a smartphone you can only telephone and text apps are what makes things different If we want to give a customer an application we have to make it easy for them Which is why Advantech has invested much in setting up WISE-PaaS The cloud platform guarantees our customers applications for IoT devices The next step is to set up a complete ecosystem for our customers our app developers improve our platform because they have the expertise that it takes Advantech is a leader in edge computing but to be more successful in AI applications we must pursue and drive this ecosystem Whats more the platform sets us apart from the competition because nobody currently has a marketplace like us with WISE-PaaS Your annual report says that your biggest market is North America Why is that? Its because were doing a very good job One reason why were so successful there is our strong team almost like a company in its own right It shows that thorough localization in a country is the right way We have our own fabs in the USA our own R&Dteam even our own sales operation Abig advantage is that these are mostly local persons Another point is that we concentrate on embedded computing and dont try to promote other kinds of business in America Do you think you can carry over this concept to other markets like Europe for instance? Were also doing very well in Europe but we can do better still Advantech isnt yet an established brand name in Europe like it is in the USA or Asia To change that weve taken Dirk Finstel into the team for example as associate vice president and CTO for embedded IoT Our aim is to copy the concept from the USA and cement our own brand DEVELOPERS ARE COMPELLED TO PROCESS DATA AT THE EDGE We also want to localize our business in Europe with the different countries and many different languages With our new strategy we want to address the various markets in Europe and show that were present in a country and in its language We also want to improve onthespot service including all logistics Why is turnover in China and Taiwan slackening? One reason for a drop is the trade conflict between the USA and China Half of our fabs are in China much production was transfered there People take time to adapt to the change and get on with their work China Taiwan Korea and even Japan are affected We still produce good work in China because the government wants to avoid any sizeable losses and is consequently investing in infrastructure on a large scale we can still keep business up and going there What business units does Advantech want to strengthen in 2020? Technically seen Advantech is changing from a purely platform provider to a services provider The key to this is a good software package That way we can expand our market Were in a phase of transformation to reach the next stage we have to offer services Ithink AI is the key to success We must enlarge our platforms to tackle the transition from a hardware enterprise to a services enterprise Do you think you can find the software developers needed for this shortterm? Unfortunately we dont have enough people to develop the kind of software we need So on the one hand we have our ecosystem partners and system integrators and on the other our software partners We want to invite more ventures to join the platform We want to become the Apple of the embedded industry Two times running you were listed among Taiwans five best brands What does that mean for you? It means that our commitment is going in the right direction But more than that it means people are beginning to trust us as a brand Thats important both for the customer and the business It makes it easier for us to find new people because were regarded as trustworthy in Taiwan We want to be more attractive in Europe too and grow further TS Thanks for talking to us