In today’s manufacturing landscape, the boundary between digital and operational systems is increasingly blurred, requiring more and more integration between systems. Machines that once operated in isolation are now networked, driven by sensors and integrated into broader data ecosystems. This digital evolution leads to greater efficiency, but also reveals a series of new obstacles. The main one concerns the communication and collaboration of IT and OT teams.
Historically, IT and OT have always been separate and distinct, both in their approach to problems and in the tools they use. Today, however, with the acceleration of digitalization, this separation is no longer functional and creates enormous critical issues: from unmanageable downtime, to confusion over the attribution of responsibilities to the slowness of incident resolution.
To remain competitive, manufacturing organizations must bridge this gap once and for all. The solution is within reach: within a single environment that supports collaboration between IT and OT, platforms like EasyVista’s enable the separation of domains without overlaps or interference.
Why IT and OT Must Communicate
Until recently, OT operated independently, while IT has built its own governance over the years. Now, however, companies must necessarily rely on digital systems for automation, analysis, and monitoring. And this means that OT depends on IT for critical infrastructure, from network connectivity to cloud services.
Unfortunately, collaboration between these two groups is not always smooth and frictionless. They speak different “languages.” OT teams think in terms of equipment cycles and safety protocols; IT teams talk about service levels, configurations, and tickets. When a networked sensor disconnects, whose problem is it: those who manage the physical infrastructure or those who manage the data?
Bridging this communication gap is essential to increase operational resilience.
The Cost of Downtime and Disconnection
When IT and OT operate in silos, incidents risk going unnoticed or receiving non-resolving intervention. Let’s take an example: a malfunctioning machine triggers an OT alarm, but can actually only be repaired by an IT operator who should correct a corrupted configuration. Without shared visibility, precious time is lost in directing the problem to the team that has the necessary skills.
In production, even a brief delay can cause cascade effects:
- production line interruptions, resulting in failure to meet production targets;
- supply chain disruption, with inevitable delays in downstream operations;
- increased waste due to production cycle interruption;
- safety risks, when automated controls fail unexpectedly.
The problem is that a common platform and process for effective collaboration are missing. This is where the EasyVista platform can make a difference: Bringing IT and OT teams under the same technological umbrella, managing domain separation in a controlled way, and fostering transparent communication through a shared service management ecosystem.
Domain Separation: Autonomy Where Needed, Collaboration Where It Counts
With domain separation, as supported within EasyVista Service Manager, both IT and OT can use the same digital environment while maintaining independent permissions and configurations. Each team continues to reference their own processes and terminology, but benefits from a shared view of incidents, resources, and dependencies.
For example, when a machine sensor fails, it’s possible to create an automatic ticket in the OT domain, and make it automatically visible to IT if the root cause involves a network component or application. This ensures correct attribution of responsibilities, while protecting data ownership and integrity in both domains.
Shared CMDB: A Single Source of Truth for Every Asset
One of the biggest obstacles to collaboration is visibility. OT teams often maintain separate spreadsheets or proprietary systems to track machines, while IT manages servers and devices in their own asset inventory. As a result, when something breaks, no one has the complete picture.
EasyVista Service Manager solves this problem by integrating a CMDB, a shared configuration management database that includes both IT and OT assets and allows both teams to see how assets are connected to each other. If a control system within a facility fails, IT can immediately check whether the problem is attributable to a network node and OT can assess the mechanical implications.
By working on the same data set, any duplications are eliminated and the possibility of miscommunication is reduced. Greater transparency leads directly to faster root cause analysis and reduces mean time to resolution (MTTR).
Workflows: Speed and Consistency in Every Response
In traditional configurations, incident management takes the form of “manual escalation”: someone calls someone else who calls someone else again, while time, relentlessly, passes. The EasyVista platform is able to automate the entire process through configurable workflows and routing rules that assign incidents to the correct team, instantly and based on context.
Thanks to a highly configurable routing engine, incidents are directed according to specific parameters, such as: asset type, production line, or priority.
The workflow designer allows manufacturers to visually model their specific processes, with a high level of granularity and detail, without the need for coding. The result is faster incident routing, fewer errors, and a consistent response every time.
Role-Based Dashboards: Real-Time Visibility for Everyone
Often, as we’ve already said, communication is the weak point, because each department ends up seeing only part of a whole that remains invisible. EasyVista’s role-based dashboards offer both IT and OT a unified but personalized view of operations.
On the IT side, dashboards highlight the health status of digital infrastructure: network uptime, system alerts, and ticket queues. On the OT side, instead, dashboards monitor machine availability, environmental sensor data, and maintenance schedules. Shared widgets allow both teams to observe incidents that cross domain boundaries. This contextual visibility creates trust.
Supporting OT with IT Skills
As digital transformation impacts facilities, OT teams must face challenges that go beyond mechanical systems. Cybersecurity, cloud integration, and data governance all fall within IT’s traditional domain, but now directly influence production.
EasyVista Service Manager allows IT to support OT teams while leaving them in control. Using shared workflows and the CMDB, IT can apply its expertise in incident management to OT systems: from categorization to change management, respecting the operational context.
For example, if an IoT-connected sensor receives an alert related to security levels, IT governs network isolation while OT ensures that the production process continues safely. Collaboration is seamless because both teams work within the same platform, with defined boundaries and shared knowledge.
This technological infrastructure eliminates a certain “us versus them” mentality that has long plagued the manufacturing sector.
Reducing Downtime Through Proactive Collaboration
Thanks to data sharing, automated routing, and collaborative dashboards, downtime is no longer unexpected and difficult to deal with. EasyVista enables proactive maintenance by integrating with monitoring tools that detect anomalies early.
When an alert indicates an anomaly in a machine component, the system automatically generates a ticket, assigns it to the OT maintenance team, and notifies IT if it is essential that checks be performed on digital applications. This coordinated response allows repairs to be made during scheduled breaks, instead of suffering emergency shutdowns.
Every incident of avoided downtime translates into measurable value: greater productivity, greater safety, and greater resilience.
Why This Approach Works
Fundamentally, bridging the gap between IT and OT means three things: visibility, accountability, and agility.
- Visibility: a unified CMDB ensures that every asset and dependency is tracked and accessible.
- Accountability: domain separation defines ownership while promoting collaboration.
- Agility: configurable workflows immediately direct incidents to the right people.
EasyVista facilitates the application of these principles through a single solution. It does not impose a one-size-fits-all model on different teams, but allows them to collaborate intelligently while preserving their specializations.
By filling communication gaps and eliminating downtime risks, manufacturing companies can achieve true digital maturity, where their IT and OT teams are capable of speaking the same language, guided by shared goals: resilience, reliability, and efficiency.