Brooke Sutherland, Columnist

GE's Tech Talk: No `B.S.'

And its software push is putting the industry on notice.

May 20, 2016 at 4:05 PM UTC

Brooke Sutherland is Bloomberg News' Boston bureau chief and writes the Industrial Strength Newsletter. She was previously a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering deals and industrial companies and an M&A reporter for Bloomberg News.

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Every year around this time, executives from some of the biggest U.S. industrial companies fly south to Florida for their annual confab.1463691296853 This year, one would think they all mistook Longboat Key for Silicon Valley.

The big buzzword at this week's gathering was software: Just about every presenter talked about ways to use technology to make their airplane engines and assembly lines smarter and more efficient. Some plans were more fully baked than others, with General Electric CEO Jeff Immelt memorably commenting that some of the digital strategies trotted out by his fellow presenters were "B.S." (He didn't name names.)

Pot shots aside, there is a notable difference in the ways industrial companies are approaching the Internet of Very Big Things, even among two of the biggest presenters: GE and United Technologies.