German Edge Cloud (GEC), Red Hat, and Fraunhofer CCIT will demonstrate at Hannover Messe how industrial companies can achieve end-to-end digitalization of their production and, for the first time, make data consistently usable from the shop floor to the cloud. Built on Red Hat OpenShift, the system leverages GEC’s ONCITE Digital Production System (DPS) with Red Hat’s advanced compute platform approach, all within the Edge Cloud Continuum defined by Fraunhofer CCIT. The result is a unified data and application architecture that enables real-time processing of production data, cross-site utilization, and scalable deployment of industrial AI applications.
Many factories have evolved over time: machines, equipment, and IT systems often operate in isolation, with data existing in different contexts and rarely usable across sites and system boundaries.
This collaboration from GEC and Red Hat brings together previously separated layers. ONCITE DPS integrates existing production environments, captures and contextualizes machine data, and provides it as a usable data foundation. Red Hat OpenShift, the industry’s leading hybrid cloud application platform powered by Kubernetes, enables applications to run consistently across edge, private, and public cloud infrastructures through containerized workloads with unified lifecycle management.
Powering scalable industrial AI
The solution establishes a foundation for industrial AI: data is processed in real time directly at the machine while simultaneously being made available for broader analytics and AI models. This allows companies to more efficiently implement and scale use cases such as predictive maintenance, process optimization, and quality analytics – from individual production cells to globally connected manufacturing networks.
Edge Cloud Continuum: using data where it creates value
A key component of the showcase is the Fraunhofer Edge Cloud Continuum, which the partners are bringing from research into industrial practice. This approach enables applications to run flexibly between edge and cloud – depending on where they deliver the greatest technical and economic value. Time-critical processes run close to the machine, while compute-intensive analytics and AI training take place in the cloud. Companies benefit from greater flexibility, improved resource utilization, and a future-proof architecture.
Managing complexity: converging IT and OT worlds
In addition to data integration, GEC and Red Hat address a key industrial challenge: operating distributed infrastructures. By using Red Hat Ansible Automation Platform, organizations can treat industrial hardware and software as “code,” to deliver a more seamless orchestration of IT and OT environments. This helps reduce manual effort, increase operational reliability, and enable scalable production solutions.
From shop floor to the “far edge” without architectural disruption
With major release 26.02, available at Hannover Messe, ONCITE DPS can also run fully on Red Hat Device Edge, a lightweight Kubernetes platform that supports workloads across small, hard-to-reach, resource-constrained devices. This allows containerized applications to be executed directly close to the equipment, with low latency and high resilience – even in environments with limited connectivity. Companies can thus expand their architecture step by step without fundamental system disruptions.
Live at Hannover Messe 2026
German Edge Cloud, Red Hat, and Fraunhofer CCIT will present the solution live at Hannover Messe 2026 at the German Edge Cloud booth (Hall 16, Booth A16).
“At Hannover Messe, we demonstrate how AI is already being used concretely in production today – with a clear focus on ease of implementation, scalability, and economic value, particularly for mid-sized companies”
says Dieter Meuser, CEO of German Edge Cloud.
