Articles and News

"End users have continually asked for expanded integration, interoperability and greater ease of use," commented John Berra, president of Emerson Process Management. "We are committed to meeting the growing needs of our existing and new customers, and implementing the EDDL enhancements in our digital devices does that."

GE Fanuc Automation is building its next generation Proficy solutions based on the new OPC Unified Architecture (OPC UA) standards released today by the OPC Foundation. The announcement was made at ARC Advisory Group's 14th Annual Forum "Driving Enterprise Performance Through Next Generation Manufacturing Concepts."

Well-respected industry executive, Ken Brown, has been named acting president of Foxboro, Massachusetts-based automation solution supplier Invensys Process Systems following yesterday’s announcement that former Process Systems president, Mike Caliel, has accepted the role of president and chief executive officer of Houston, Texas-based Integrated Electrical Services.

New program makes PAS Integrity™ software available on demand to drive down documentation & testing costs for Engineering Company participants.

These companies join BM Group, Ember Corporation, Freescale Semiconductor, Honeywell, Mitsubishi Electric, Motorola, Philips, Samsung, Siemens and Texas Instruments on the ZigBee Alliance Board of Directors.

Robotics Corporation is sponsoring the Mini-Chopper Build project, modeled after the popular TV show “American Chopper” for high school students in the Wisconsin area. The program is part of an annual event put on by Fox Valley Technical College in Appleton, WI. It is designed to expose students to high tech manufacturing techniques.

Datastick software upgrades for both its PDA and desktop PC software programs provide overall vibration alerts, spectrum averaging, and improved low-level, low-frequency performance in vibration collection and analysis.

In return, Interneer granted Itron an exclusive license to Interneer's Intellect product, as a tightly embedded module for Itron's Distribution Design Studio application. The agreement affords Itron the right to use the full functionality of the latest released version of Interneer Intellect to create appropriate product configurations, sold as available modules to Itron's Distribution Design Studio toolset.

Cleveland Motion Controls, Inc. (CMC) announced today its receipt of the 2006 Governor's Excellence in Exporting Award (eAward). The eAward recognizes a select group of Ohio-based companies whose export activities have resulted in dramatically increased sales.

Honeywell announced today it has been awarded a Process Automation Systems contract for new and existing petrochemical plants to be operated by EQUATE Petrochemical Company K.S.C. (EQUATE) at a petrochemical site in Shuaiba, Kuwait. EQUATE operates existing plants at the Shuaiba site for the production of ethylene glycol, polyethylene and polypropylene. The announced Olefins II Project between Dow and PIC will create several new plants for the production of ethylene and ethylene derivatives, which will also be operated by EQUATE.

Junot Systems, Inc., a specialist provider of plant floor focused SAP® integration solutions, announced today that they have signed a letter of intent to team with IMA Industrial, a manufacturing consulting and systems integration company based in Chile. Through this alliance, IMA’s customers in South America will now have access to Junot Systems’ SAP certified NLINK® integration solution combined with IMA’s industry expertise to provide them with a robust set of plant floor integration solutions to SAP.

Keithley test industry experts will be presenting the seminars on Wednesday, July 12, in Room 3010 in the West Hall Level 3 of the Moscone Center. Doors open at 11 AM with refreshments served and a cocktail reception following the presentations beginning at 5 PM.

The underlying ArchestrA software architecture upon which Wonderware software solutions are built supports the existing OPC standard, and will also support the new OPC Unified Architecture. The OPC UA will offer a common data model and device communications environment for plant connectivity by leveraging Microsoft .NET and Web Services functionality.

"Michigan Avenue Goes French" now has more than 30 companies on its roster for the open-air exhibition to take place from July 13 to 16, on Pioneer Court, 401 N. Michigan Ave., in Chicago. The exhibitors from aerospace, automotive, boating, electronics, medical, and other industries will display products and services to show the public how French industry plays a role in their everyday lives.

Haydon Switch & Instrument, Inc., (Haydon), Waterbury, CT, launched a newly designed website for stepper motor based linear actuators, rotary motors, leadscrew assemblies, and sealed switches.

As part of an ongoing automation upgrade at the site, Invensys -- in conjunction with its strategic partner, Apprion -- has successfully completed the first phase of a comprehensive managed wireless infrastructure deployment at PPG Industries’ large chlor-alkali chemical manufacturing complex in Lake Charles, Louisiana. This infrastructure is designed to help further improve plant profitability, safety, and security, while providing a secure, flexible, and cost-effective foundation to support additional wireless applications in the future.

Servo-Flo® 488 two-component fixed-ratio meter-mix dispense system is ideal for automated or manual high-volume dispensing applications.

This Webinar will reveal the core structural components of an IME, and the adoption and application of OSIsoft's RTPM Platform, to promote the production of: * Enterprise Manufacturing Intelligence * Real-time Performance Management * Operational Excellence * Corporate Performance Management

Simplot Australia has begun evaluation of Citect's new benchmarking service called Meta. The food manufacturing giant will evaluate the Production Performance Analytics service across five plants to leverage best practices and continuous improvement within the Australian business.

The opening of the centers allows Citect to provide standardized educational services to end users, engineers and system integrators at a global level. Major benefits to customers include the opportunity to maximize the return on their Citect investment through the standardization of world class programs, courses and certification.

AMETEK, Inc. today announced it has acquired Land Instruments International Limited ("Land Instruments"), a global supplier of high-end analytical instrumentation. With its headquarters in Dronfield, United Kingdom, Land Instruments has annual sales of approximately £22 million ($41 million).

JMP engineers are using machine vision as a reliable tool to solve a wide array of challenges facing manufacturers today. In its simplest form, a vision system can be used to positively identify a product or differentiate between two or more similar products. In more advanced applications, vision systems can be the basis of flexible and re-programmable Poke Yoke systems that check the presence and/or dimensions of components, features, and holes in products.

InSync's applications allow companies to add sense and respond capabilities to existing supply chain and asset management solutions leveraging the internet and advanced technologies such as RFID and sensor based computing. InSync's customers include Fortune 500 technology companies in the Semiconductor, Electronics and Computer industries.

Loadstar Sensors has launched a new line of products based on its patent-protected capacitive sensing technology. The products launched include the CS-Series of integrated load sensors, the DS-2100 four-channel display and LoadVUE software for easy operation on a PC.

At their recent annual meeting in Hannover Germany, the members of Interests Group SERCOS interface e.V. changed the name of the association to SERCOS International to reflect the world-wide use and acceptance of the SERCOS interface technology, as well as the internationality of its members. The names of SERCOS International’s subsidiaries, SERCOS North America and SERCOS Japan, remain unchanged.

Beckhoff Automation is pleased to announce that David Samdahl has been hired as Sales Manager for the company’s Central Region. Samdahl now serves Beckhoff customers in Minnesota, Iowa, Nebraska, Kansas, North Dakota and South Dakota. Samdahl is based in the Beckhoff Automation North American headquarters office, which is located in the Minneapolis suburb of Burnsville.

Honeywell has signed a major agreement with Linde AG, Linde Engineering Division, for its UniSim Design Suite. As a leading international engineering and contracting company, Linde Engineering designs and builds turnkey process plants for a wide variety of industrial users and applications. The UniSim Design Suite enables advanced process modeling and will help Linde engineers create steady-state and dynamic models for plant design.

Advanced Dynamics (St. Bruno, Quebec Canada) recently turned to Autodesk Design Review software to streamline its design review process and make its collaborative workflow process more efficient.

PRISM Certified training is targeted at technical professionals who have responsibility for assessing, designing, installing, inspecting, testing, operating, and/or maintaining safety instrumented systems.

Emerson Process Management has won a contract to install its PlantWeb digital plant architecture with the Ovation expert control system at Nebraska City Station Unit No. 2, a new sub-critical pulverized coal plant to be operated by Omaha Public Power District (OPPD). The 660-MW generating unit will be built adjacent to OPPD's existing Nebraska City Station Unit No. 1 facility located along the Missouri River near Nebraska City.

Invensys Process Systems will supply 11 Triconex safety instrumented systems (SIS) as part of an operations, safety and security upgrade in major offshore projects for Petroleos Mexicanos (PEMEX). At the Ku Maloob Zaap oilfields off the coast of Campeche State, Mexico, PEMEX Exploration and Production Northeast Marine Region (PEP) is undertaking a significant upgrade and expansion of its drilling and production infrastructure.

The winning project was Lake of Dreams in the Wynn, Las Vegas, which was created by SPL Integrated Solutions. This audio and video performance is unlike any other. By day, the area appears to be a 19,000-square-foot lake surrounded by a waterfall on a mountain. By night, the architectural landscape becomes a surface for video projection.

“We are pleased to be able to officially launch this branch of the company,” said John Bowron, President of Yokogawa Canada, Inc. “Yokogawa has always believed that a commitment made is a commitment kept. We promised when we opened the office a little over a year ago, that we would continue to build the infrastructure required to meet the rapidly growing demands of the Canadian marketplace."

Yokogawa Electric Corporation announced a plan to establish a subsidiary in Vietnam that will provide engineering and maintenance services and increase the competitiveness of its industrial automation and control business in this country, which is experiencing sustained rapid economic growth.

Wittur Turkey identified time and cost savings in several development phases, including planning, design, bills of material management, order confirmation, and production.

Emerson Process Management has been awarded a contract by Taiwan Power Company (also known as Taipower) to supply Fisher valves for general turbine-generator control systems, commonly referred to as balance-of-plant applications, in the Taiwan Lunmen Nuclear Power Number 4 plant. Expected to be fully operational in 2010, the project involves a 2,700 MW plant consisting of two 1,350 MW units at Yenliao, on the north eastern tip of Taiwan, near the capital Taipei.

In order to celebrate this big event with current and potential end-users of Moxa products, Moxa Networking has planned a Lucky Draw event. Winners of the drawing will receive an official 2006 FIFA World Cup Ball, with a new winner chosen each week from the pool of registrants. The Lucky Draw Event will last until July 31.

Rockwell Automation, Inc. today announced its plan to sell the company's Dodge® mechanical and Reliance Electric™ motors and motor repair services businesses. These are leading producers of mechanical power transmission products and industrial motors, and are the principal businesses of the company's Power Systems reporting segment. Rockwell Automation will retain the Reliance Electric and Reliance branded drives and related parts and services as an integral part of its global drives and customer service businesses.

Sigmafine, the OSIsoft solution for data validation and reconciliation, is a configurable tool that can be used in a variety of industries. The presentation will include the specific challenges to each industry, from the oil and gas to metals and mining, and the application of Sigmafine to estimating, assuring valuable material balances, resolving energy loss, and greatly improved decision support.

Training topics cover areas such as digital servo drives, CNC programming, press fit and tightening, general automation, and a variety of maintenance and troubleshooting classes for various hardware configurations.

In order to realize the VigilantPlant concept, Yokogawa offers products and solutions in line with three key slogans: “See Clearly - achieve stable and accurate real-time information exchange,” “Know in Advance - anticipate changes and plan actions in advance,” and “Act with Agility - make fast and intelligent decisions.”

In this new role Ian will be responsible for the development and support of not only MTL's present fieldbus products but also new technologies that will be critical to the ongoing success of both MTL and its customers.

Executives from Cingular Wireless, Verizon Wireless, and Sprint Nextel - the three largest wireless carriers in the United States - will kick off the second annual M2M United conference, held this year in San Antonio, with a morning keynote address on June 27.

The order includes dynamic applications network metsoDNA, DNAhistorian data management system, field engineering and installation. The comissioning of the system is scheduled for February 2007. The Dundee refinery is one of the largest bitumen suppliers in the UK.

Al Rushaid Group and Flowserve Corp. ratified an agreement today to build the largest original equipment manufacturer (OEM) pump repair, manufacturing and training facility in the Middle East. Construction of the 20,500 square meter (220,660 square feet) complex, to be located at the Al Rushaid Oil Field Center in Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, will commence in July 2006.

The Automation Federation is an umbrella organization under which associations and societies engaged in manufacturing and process automation activities can work more effectively to fulfill their missions. It coordinates the work of member organizations engaged in advancement of the science and engineering of automation technologies and applications.

Command Tooling System's new high-speed machining demo at IMTS will allow visitors to experience the difference between Thermolock holders vs. conventional toolholders, the benefits of balanceable boring heads, and the difference between single-point boring vs new reaming technology.

This version of the guidelines includes the guidelines for PackAL, an application library of common software elements used in packaging machinery applications that was developed by the PackSoft subgroup of the OPW.

Sola/Hevi-Duty has been awarded a U.S. Patent for the company's uniquely durable mounting clip utilized in the installation of its DIN Rail power supplies, line reactors, surge suppressors and uninterruptible power supplies.