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BP's oil rigs just got their own Internet of Things

BP remains controversial to this day, but this isn't about oil spills or the company's questionable practices to cover them up. Nope, this is about BP and GE teaming up to connect the former's oil wells to the internet. The oil-and-gas giant has connected 650 of its wells to GE's Predix data gathering and analytics platform for the partnership's pilot project. See, each well has up to 30 sensors that measure its pressure and temperature, among other data. Now that the company is using GE's software, it can access those information in real time and even upload data to the Predix cloud for further analysis.

All the data BP collects will help it see trends, allowing it to predict well flows, plan its extractions and even prevent downtime. To be clear, BP has been using well-monitoring software that the company itself developed for a long time, but it's old and quickly becoming outdated. Predix is easy to use and install: "Previously we had four or five ways of doing it and now have a much more consistent approach," BP strategist Peter Griffiths told Fortune. If this pilot goes well, the British oil corp plans to connect all the 4,000 wells it owns around the globe to the platform sometime in 2016.

[Image credit: Wikipedia]