“The open-source mindset is all about getting involved and sharing input. Take some time, learn about i3x™ and contribute to it.”
Manufacturing Information Modeling & Namespace Foundations Course™
This course equips manufacturing professionals to design and implement standardized information models using CESMII Smart Manufacturing Profiles, enabling interoperable, scalable, and AI-ready manufacturing systems.
Manufacturers are navigating a growing challenge: fragmented, proprietary APIs across platforms, historians, and applications are creating integration complexity that slows innovation. The Industrial Information Interoperability eXchange (i3X™) is emerging as a solution—an open, vendor-agnostic API designed to standardize how applications interact with contextualized manufacturing data across platforms.
Whether you are a manufacturer, systems integrator, developer, or technology provider, download this episode to learn how i3x can impact the future of interoperable manufacturing architectures.
Top 5 Takeaways
- Address “API chaos” with a common, open information platform. Fragmented, proprietary APIs can slow integration and innovation. i3X provides a vendor-agnostic approach to standardize how applications access contextualized data, enabling scalable, AI-ready interoperability.
- Standard approaches fuel execution. i3X is not about replacing existing technologies like OPC UA or MQTT, it’s about bringing them together through a common access platform. By defining a shared interface layer, i3X can enable interoperability without constraining technology choices.
- Design for interoperability. Take your environment from either/or to and. No single vendor can meet every need in today’s manufacturing landscape. i3X creates a unifying approach that allows diverse platforms, applications, and data sources to work together in a common framework.
- Lower the barrier to innovation and participation. With a flexible and open-source mindset, i3X makes it easier for developers, integrators, and manufacturers to engage. The goal is not rigid compliance, but practical adoption to enable real value across the manufacturing ecosystem.
- Engage early and shape what comes next. i3X is intentionally released as an early, evolving initiative. Its success depends on real-world testing, feedback, and contribution from across the ecosystem. The success of smart manufacturing relies on a community aligned around common standards.
For more insights, be sure to tune into the full episode on Apple or Spotify.
Thank you to our panelists:
- Aron Semle – Chief Technology Officer at HighByte
- Matthew Parris – Director of Quality Test Systems, GE Appliances – A Haier Company
- Jonathan Wise – Chief Technology Architect at CESMII
- Jeff Winter, Host and Smart Manufacturing Advisor at CESMII
Industrial Information Interoperability eXchange (i3X)
The Industrial Information Interoperability Exchange (i3X™) is an open, common API initiative proposed to address a growing interoperability challenge in modern manufacturing architectures: manufacturing data silo proliferation and API chaos. As manufacturers adopt heterogeneous software stacks from multiple vendors, the industry risks repeating past fragmentation seen with protocols, platforms, and namespaces — this time at the API layer.
