GS-Inima Transforms Water Operations with Barbara’s Edge Computing Platform

The Challenge: Fragmented Data, Limited Visibility

GS Inima, a Spanish Water  treatment and desalination Operator, manages more than 200 projects across 12 countries. Yet, like many industrial players, they faced a growing challenge: fragmented data systems and a lack of real-time visibility into their operations.

Each facility operated with its own SCADA system, often in isolation. Without access to historical data, the water operator lacked the centralized insights needed to build predictive maintenance models or optimize performance based on seasonal factors like rainfall or peak summer demand.

To modernize their infrastructure and gain a real-time, centralized view of operations, GS-Inima needed a new kind of edge infrastructure, flexible, scalable, and purpose-built for industrial operations.

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“For a long time, we simply didn’t have the the tools to capture data and to understand what was going on in our facilities. Our operations rely on a wide variety of SCADA systems, making it difficult to collect, unify, and retain data.”‍– José María Redondo, Digital Transformation Lead at GS-Inima

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The Solution: Building a Secure Edge Infrastructure with Barbara

At the heart of the solution is Barbara OS, a cybersecure operating system designed to run applications at the edge, even in complex, disconnected environments. Alongside it, Barbara Panel provides centralized orchestration, allowing GS-Inima to remotely manage, update, and secure all deployed edge devices and applications from a single interface.

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1. Architecture in Action

The architecture operates on two levels ( Figure 1) :

• At the Edge: Edge Nodes deployed at the Seseña Water Plant.
• At the Core: A centralized server managed by GS-Inima.

At the Edge:

.- Barbara OS runs on nodes at each water plant.

.- Applications are deployed as modular microservices, handling data collection, processing, and local storage securely.

At the Central Server :

.- A single point of control and visibility, integrated with SAP dashboards and analytics tools.

.- Data exchange uses the OData protocol, ensuring standardized access across diverse systems.

Each location has a unique identifier, and all data attributes are standardized for compatibility and future analysis.

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2. Edge Node Functionality

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Using Barbara's platform, the edge nodes collect data from various sources:

• SCADA systems using OPC-UA
• Photovoltaic inverters via Modbus

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Data is stored locally in InfluxDB time-series databases and visualized via Grafana dashboards. Information is then pushed securely to SAP using OData connectors, transforming raw data into actionable insights , from hydraulic behavior monitoring to energy production analysis.

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Applications deployed on Edge Nodes:

• MQTT Broker: Publishes and subscribes to system communications.
• OPC-UA Connector: Reads and shares sensor data via MQTT.
• InfluxDB: Time-series database for data storage.
• Grafana: Data visualization tool.
• InfluxDB Ingestor: Barbara-developed app to feed MQTT data into InfluxDB.
• OData Middleware: Exposes data in a format SAP can consume

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Because the system is modular, GS Inima can easily update or replace components, scale to new sites, and adapt to future use cases such as predictive maintenance or anomaly detection.

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Key Outcomes: Real Impact in Less Than a Year

In under 12 months, GS-Inima achieved:

✅ To deploy edge nodes in Seseña (Spain) and in Ensenada (Mexico)
✅ Full operational and energy visibility across facilities
✅ Unified, real-time KPI dashboard integrated into SAP

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About Barbara

Barbara empowers industrial companies to run advanced data applications and AI algorithms securely at the edge, close to where data is generated. Barbara’s strength lies in its full-stack Edge Management and Orchestration (EMO) platform, purpose-built for industrial environment.

Barbara's Technology Stack includes:

• Industrial Connectors to integrate legacy and next-gen equipment.
• Edge App Orchestration for remote deployment of docker-based applications.
• Edge AI capabilities to run machine learning models locally.
• Fleet Management to securely provision, update, and monitor thousands of distributed devices.

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👉 Discover the full project story here

Contact us today to learn how Barbara can accelerate your industrial transformation journey.

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