If machines could talk, what would they tell you? Well, now they can, and a Wayne predictive maintenance pioneer has developed machine learning software to effectively listen to them.

That’s why fast-growing product service software company PTC is so interested in ColdLight — PTC just invested $105 million to buy the local company; when machines communicate about what’s happening internally, parts can be repaired or replaced before they fail and inefficiencies can be corrected or redesigned.

“The dollars and cents that can be saved on the business side are mind-boggling,” PTC President and CEO Jim Heppelmann said in a Fortune magazine report of the deal, noting too that one client realized a full return on its investment in PTC the first month.

For ColdLight’s role in the larger parent company, its Neuron software is expected to be paired with Thingworx’s Exton-originated Internet of Things application platform in order to  “serve as the foundation for PTC’s futuristic strategy of creating a ‘digital twin’ for every physical thing monitored via sensors and a wireless Internet connection,” the article stated.

PTC earlier acquired Thingworx for $112 million and award-winning machine cloud developer Axeda for $170 million.

“We share PTC’s vision for the need to improve how data is captured, analyzed, understood and acted upon in order to help organizations drive more impactful IoT strategy,” ColdLight CEO Ryan Caplan said in a company announcement. “We believe all industries, but especially manufacturing, can benefit from a data analytics strategy in the Internet of Things era. We are excited to pursue this broad set of opportunities with the resources and proven IoT technology portfolio that PTC provides.”

ColdLight utilizes sensors on the inside of medical devices, manufacturing machinery and retail products to feed analytical software that then translates the data into actionable information.

Read more about ColdLight’s capabilities and the implications of its acquisition by PTC in Forbes here, and check out previous Vista.Today coverage of PTC’s related acquisition of Exton-based Thingworx here.