NI Connect: Going Beyond Test to Harness Insights That Drive Powerful Outcomes

At the end of July, we brought together thousands of engineers and experts from across industries during NI Connect—our global, digital event exploring the latest test and data analytics trends.

Customers, partners, and NI technical experts discussed how software-connected solutions help them unlock and connect their data to accelerate digital transformation, enabling them to optimize every step of the product life cycle.

The Highlights

To start off the event, Eric Starkloff took the global stage for a live keynote emphasizing the importance of test data, which helps you understand the performance of your product or process, and the challenge engineers face integrating it all into the design process. In fact, we know from our customers’ experience that more than 90 percent of that valuable data goes unused. Imagine the opportunities you’re missing because data is siloed in another part of the product life cycle. We know it can be better.

"A digital thread of data across each phase of the product life cycle delivers powerful insights to enhance product performance," said NI CEO Eric Starkloff. “At NI, our software-connected approach unlocks the power of test, from early research to the production floor and beyond. We continue to aggressively invest in the technology to make this compelling vision a reality.”

We also know that delivering on that vision requires an ecosystem of companies connecting their tools together to deliver value to engineers. NI can help you connect your data, but we can also be the expert that connects you to the right systems, analytics, and partners.

As an example, we heard from Cadence, Ansys, MathWorks, and Seagate about how they’re using NI systems and solutions to improve their development and manufacturing processes. 

We didn’t stop there. Experts took the stage to talk with these customers and partners about the next generation of wireless communications, the way test and measurement is evolving beyond the PC, and how autonomous systems (and more importantly, the engineers working on them) are impacting the future of mobility all over the world. You can see their conversations firsthand on our YouTube channel.

Products, Trends, and Insights

Throughout the rest of the day, engineers from around the world came together to explore industry trends that are advancing technology development and learn about NI’s newest product offerings. Among them:

• SystemLink™ Software—With a unified view of test operations in design validation and production environments, SystemLink manages and simplifies test scheduling, resource utilization, system health, and maintenance.​ 
• LabVIEW —Open-source software is increasingly important, and we want to make it easier for engineers to connect disparate systems in design and validation environments. Our 2021 version of LabVIEW features improved interoperability with Python and MathWorks MATLAB® software to help do just that.
• PXI—Like open-source software, modular hardware also needs flexibility to connect with existing systems and workflows. PXI hardware delivers openness, software options, modularity, and I/O coverage to develop adaptive and scalable systems.
• Ettus USRP X410—Wireless technologies are becoming increasingly complex, and advanced tools are needed to support research and prototyping. Our new Ettus USRP X410 Software Defined Radio high performance and fully open source, helping engineers prototype faster, and accelerate wireless innovation.

Missed Connections

If you want to stay connected, check out our podcast Testing…1, 2, 3, register for Tech Connect, our ongoing webinar series, or join us at the next NI Connect.

^{MATLAB® is a registered trademark of The MathWorks, Inc.}