Smart buildings specialist Johnson Controls has partnered with DigiCert, a provider of digital certificate services and PKI solutions, to provide customers with advanced connectivity for smart building technology.
The partnership enables the Johnson Controls OpenBlue digital solutions suite to utilize DigiCert’s ONE PKI platform.
“This strategic partnership allows Johnson Controls to offer our customers increased peace of mind by mitigating the risk of costly operational interruptions due to cybersecurity attacks while providing resilient, trusted smart building solutions that use the most advanced PKI technology from DigiCert,” said Mike Ellis, EVP and chief customer & digital officer at Johnson Controls. “Our domain expertise in healthy, secure and smart buildings, combined with DigiCert’s trusted digital identity and automated certificate management capabilities, will further enhance our OpenBlue suite and offer a clear advantage for smart building operations.”
The two firms said that the Johnson Controls-DigiCert PKI solution elevates operations within the Operational Technology (OT) and Internet of Things (IoT) space to ensure that hardware, software and communication remains trusted throughout the lifecycle of the smart building. This approach brings modern PKI security as well as advanced expertise in managing digital certificates to provide device authentication and identity, data encryption and integrity for each component of the ecosystem, the partners said.
Mike Nelson, vice president of IoT security at DigiCert, said: “DigiCert ONE singularly offers container-based, cloud-native technology for fully automated certificate management with flexible deployment and secure and simple integration with the OpenBlue ecosystem. DigiCert ONE’s IoT Device Manager provides complete IoT device lifecycle management that, together with OpenBlue, will ensure secure digital transformation of smart buildings.”
Johnson Controls also recently announced its partnership with Pelion, to accelerate innovation in connectivity, security and intelligence at the edge for Johnson Controls OpenBlue technology. Pelion’s device and edge management capabilities will be used with DigiCert services to ensure digital identities maintain a high level of trust in OpenBlue solutions.
Last month, Johnson Controls had also announced the launch of OpenBlue Buildings as a Service with the aim of enabling the firm and its customers to be more agile in delivering outcome-based decisions centered around integrated data to help reach environmental stewardship goals.
Through OpenBlue Buildings as a Service, building owners are able to transfer the ?full lifecycle risk? of building operations to Johnson Controls. The company said this can include upfront capital and decision-making processes, responsibility for design and construction, energy efficiency and emissions management, as well as operations including maintenance and retrofits.
