Google Cloud and Siemens today announced a collaboration to develop artificial intelligence (AI) and automation services for manufacturing and industrial use cases.

“By simplifying the deployment of AI in industrial use cases, we’re helping employees augment their critical work on the shop floor,” Dominik Wee, managing director of manufacturing and industrial at Google Cloud, said in a statement.

Under the agreement, Siemens plans to integrate Google Cloud’s data, AI, and machine learning technologies with its factory automation software. A Google Cloud spokesperson said the companies will provide more details in future announcements.

“Over the next few months we will be announcing specific Google Cloud solutions that will be integrated and offered as a joint solution,” the spokesperson said. “These will include solutions to address factory automation use cases such as quality control and energy efficiency.”

Combining the two companies’ technology will help joint customers harmonize their factory data, run cloud-based AI/ML models on top of that data, and deploy algorithms at the network edge, the partners say. This will also enable applications such as visual inspection of products or predicting the wear-and-tear of machines on the assembly line.

Many manufacturers use legacy software and multiple systems to analyze plant information, which is resource-intensive and requires frequent manual updates. And while companies have deployed AI pilot projects, they remain siloed across the plant floor as manufacturers struggle to implement AI at scale, according to Siemens.

“The potential for artificial intelligence to radically transform the plant floor is far from being exhausted. Many manufacturers are still stuck in AI pilot projects today — we want to change that,” said Axel Lorenz, VP of control and factory automation for Siemens Digital Industries, in a statement.

Siemens also uses Google Cloud’s Chronicle security capabilities in a managed service it provides to secure energy customers’ IT and operational technology across hybrid cloud environments.

The Siemens deal follows another manufacturing collaboration that Google Cloud announced earlier this month. Under that one, with industrial software maker OSIsoft, now owned by Aveva, the software provider will deploy its industrial-sector data management platform on Google Cloud.

Siemens also has similar smart factory partnerships with Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Alibaba Cloud, all of which support its IoT and automation software on their cloud infrastructure. Earlier this year, Siemens inked a deal with IBM to run its IoT and edge software in an on-premises private cloud.