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This week I’m reporting from Detroit, Michigan, where Siemens is hosting its annual Realize Live user conference (the American version, anyways).
The topic of the week is—let’s see, I wrote it down somewhere—ah yes, artificial intelligence.
“It can’t be a meeting if someone’s not talking about AI,” Tony Hemmelgarn, CEO of Siemens Digital Industries Software, told the 3,000 or so attendees in his opening keynote. I can assure you that many people in many meetings spoke about AI at Realize Live 2026.
Hemmelgarn kicked off his keynote with an attention-grabbing analogy: “Wildfires,” he said, “never stand still. The wind turns without warning, the heat builds, humidity vanishes. A perimeter that was once safe becomes a trap. In that environment, yesterday’s data is dangerous.”
Just as I began to wonder if I hadn’t accidentally wandered into the wrong conference, Hemmelgarn brought it home.
“I’m not equating manufacturing with a wildfire, but viability, unpredictability, speed of change—all those things sound very familiar,” he said, pointing out manufacturing pain points such as supply chain disruptions and shifting regulations. “You can’t stop instability, but you can use it as a competitive advantage.”
That advantage, for both wildfires and manufacturing, comes from clearly understanding all the relevant variables. Not as they were last week, or yesterday, or an hour ago, but as they are right now.
“A true digital enterprise connects engineering, manufacturing, and supply chain into one shared real-time picture,” Hemmelgarn said.
Siemens sees AI as an instrumental part of that real-time picture, but with a big caveat.
“AI only works if you’re building engineering truth,” Hemmelgarn said. “… the data’s got to be trusted, it’s got to be accurate, it’s got to be managed, it’s got to be connected.”
To that end, Siemens announced a new addition to its Xcelerator portfolio: Intelligence Center X. Details are a bit scarce so far, but here’s what we do know.
What is Siemens Intelligence Center X?
Joining the likes of Siemens’ Simcenter, Teamcenter, Opcenter, and Designcenter suites, Intelligence Center X is a set of tools for industrial intelligence.
“Intelligence Center X brings together enterprise data with industrial ontologies and Siemens’ knowledge graph capabilities in a governed environment to empower organizations to apply AI with confidence and achieve consistent, measurable outcomes,” Hemmelgarn said in the press release.
“Industrial ontologies” is a phrase Hemmelgarn and other Siemens execs tossed around with aplomb at Realize Live. I’m still chasing a concise definition, but I’m told “ontologies” is being used in the technical sense (see the Wikipedia entry for Ontology (information science) for all the esoteric details). As far as I can gather, it refers to a context specific, end-to-end, and up-to-date model of some product or production process.
When it launches—date TBD—Intelligence Center X will include four components: Graph Studio (based on Altair Rapidminer), AI Studio (also based on Altair Rapidminer), Mendix (more on that shortly), and a set of industrial ontologies (more on that when I learn what it means).
Mendix used to be Siemens’ low-code development platform, but in the AI era of vibe coding, Mendix is pivoting to a platform for “agentic development and orchestration,” according to Joe Bohman, EVP of PLM products at Siemens. Mendix is the start of the Intelligence Center X process, Bohman said. Graph Studio gives users “a massive ability to be able to put data in context” and AI Studio is “for all your machine learning needs.”
I’ll report back on Intelligence Center X as more details become available. I’ll also have more to say on AI in Designcenter, so stay tuned for that.
Meanwhile, Siemens isn’t the only engineering software developer making moves (or using the suffix X).
Autodesk to acquire MaintainX for $3.6 billion
Autodesk has announced an agreement to acquire MaintainX, a developer of maintenance and operations software, for approximately $3.6 billion in an all-cash transaction. The deal is expected to close later this fiscal year (which for Autodesk ends on January 31, 2027).
With the acquisition, Autodesk is also creating a new business unit: Autodesk Operations Solutions, or AOS. The new unit will be led by senior vice president Stephen Hooper, who was formerly VP of cloud-based product design and manufacturing solutions.
“Autodesk is expanding beyond design and make to operations, ensuring data and insights flow seamlessly in a continuous lifecycle,” Andrew Anagnost, Autodesk CEO, said in the press release. “Our goal with MaintainX is to bring deep operational expertise, contextual data, and workflows that enhance our ability to use AI to converge digital and physical worlds.”
Sounds a bit familiar, no? At least there’s nothing about industrial ontologies to parse in this announcement.
More on AOS and the MaintainX acquisition to come. Subscribe to Engineering.com’s 3D Design and Simulation newsletters so you won’t miss out.
One last link
Tired of reading about industrial AI yet? No? Ok, then check out this article from my colleague Michael Ouellette, senior editor of Engineering.com: Industrial AI isn’t really about AI at all.
Got news, tips, comments, or complaints? Send them my way: malba@wtwhmedia.com.