Articles and News

The ABB Automation World 2006 Users Conference and Exhibition, held in Houston, Texas last week (May 9-11, 2006) exceeded prior event attendance by more than 45%, totalling more than 2,500 attendees. The three-day event (May 9-11) was substantially bigger than ABB Automation World 2005 and featured 400 workshops and a 40,000 square foot exhibition hall with hands-on demonstrations and displays of ABB automation products and systems.

The three-phase project restructures the system architecture to a high speed, fiber-based system, upgrades existing PROVUE consoles to the latest DeltaV consoles and integrates the three existing control rooms into one centralized location. Since 1982, the Emerson PROVOX distributed control system at the Solutia plant has provided flexible and reliable control. It has been well maintained and regularly upgraded with Emerson keeping Solutia fully advised about the continued availability of spares and support.

Larson will assume the leadership role for nuclear quality assurance processes involving groups that serve the nuclear industry. Within Invensys Process Systems, these include Triconex safety instrumented systems, Foxboro process automation, Foxboro Measurements and Instruments, project operations, customer satisfaction, and Invensys Process Systems China. Larson will report to David Golden, Global Director of Quality for Invensys Process Systems.

ATS Automation Tooling Systems Inc. today announced that it has entered into a strategic relationship with GD Technologies, a private Chinese-based precision machining company, and is expanding two automation systems facilities in China to further its growth strategy in Asia.

The Global Outsourcing 100 list sets a precedent by providing the first industry-wide benchmark for overall outsourcing excellence. It includes companies in such areas as information technology and business process outsourcing, facility services, real estate and capital asset management, manufacturing, and logistics. ATS was ranked 30th out of the 100 companies listed.

Matrikon Inc. announced that it intends to make a normal course issuer bid to purchase its common shares. Under the bid, Matrikon intends to acquire up to 1,559,248 common shares, representing not more than 5% of the 31,184,959 common shares issued and outstanding as of May 1, 2006. The bid will commence May 17, 2006 and end May 17, 2007.

Emerson, the project's Main Instrumentation and Controls Contractor (MICC), also has begun integration and testing of the digital automation system. Upon completion of integration and testing, the company will install its PlantWeb digital architecture, assist with the expansion project's commissioning and startup, and provide operator training.

The control system is designed to produce consistency in production variability and a single electronic record of operations. The system will be used at Genentech’s Vacaville, Calif. plant, which is currently undergoing a major expansion.

Represented this year at ABB's Automation World were (18) internal business units, (4) communications partners, (10) media partners and (9) technology partners. The 40,000 sq ft of exhibits that housed this was indeed impressive. In the center of the hall was a café area where you could go and talk business with some of the over 2500 registrants from 36 countries.

The sensors replace outdated manual gauge- and fuel flow-reading processes that cost railroads time, money and personnel. The new automated fuel management systems provide railroads the ability to better manage fuel inventories and reduce labor demands.

The Emerson solution was chosen by Drax Power and Capula, the contractor undertaking the refurbishment, following presentations and demonstrations of interfacing the Rosemount 3420 fieldbus interface module to their Schneider PLC host system. Drax Power Station uses six steam boilers to generate up to 4000MW. At curre

This agreement allows Power/mation to sell and support Precise Automation’s products in the northern United States. These products include PrecisePlace robots, Guidance motion controllers and PreciseVision software.

The Microsoft Mobile & Embedded Developers' Conference is one powerful gathering of brainpower. Thousands of members of Microsoft's Mobile and Embedded development communities get together for in-depth technical training, hands-on technology sessions, presentations from leading experts and networking opportunities with industry peers. That's why Intermec is particularly honored that this year's conference features Intermec RFID and mobile computing gear.

The Restriction of Hazardous Substances (RoHS) directive and its companion Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment (WEEE) directive were drafted to prevent the massive increase of electronic waste entering Europe's landfills.

MICE, PowerMICE and MACH 4000 product families have special software packages, called Industrial Profiles. These network components can then be totally integrated in the three standard protocols PROFINET, EtherNet/IP or Modbus TCP. This integration enables both the configuration and monitoring of the network components according to the plug & play principle.

Industrial HiVision network management software (Operator Edition 2.0) has automatic discovery of the network topology via LLDP (Link Layer Discovery Protocol). With this protocol, network components and end devices such as PLCFs or I/O components can be discovered exactly and monitored reliably. This software is particularly suitable for use in complex, redundant Ethernet networks and is available for Windows 2000/XP and Linux operating systems.

The starting point for the alliance will be a joint trade fair stand at the Interkama+ “Secure Automation” (hall 7, stand A43), the international lead fair for process automation within the Hannover Messe. Both companies will present innovative solutions covering the fields of industrial security and Industrial Ethernet.

The capital raised will be used to support the commercialization of existing products as well as accelerate key product developments. Additionally, it will enable Aspectrics to expand its support infrastructure to its major customers in the food, water and hydrocarbon processing industries.

In a continuance of the OAGIS and ISA-95 standards convergence effort announced in December of 2005, a key working meeting took place recently at ISA offices in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina. The meeting, which was held April 26 through 28, was attended by many end user and solution providers in addition to representatives from the standards organizations. The purpose of the meeting was to delve into the important detailed technical work necessary to achieve the convergence goals for the OAGIS(r) and ISA-95 standards.

Under the terms of the agreement, Honeywell will provide LCM technology support and migrate Lyondell’s existing process automation system to the Honeywell Experion® Process Knowledge System (PKS). Experion PKS will help Lyondell optimize operational efficiency, improve production output and reduce the risk of errors for operators. Honeywell will also provide support services to help Lyondell improve maintenance efficiency and reduce costs.

The aim of the contest is to encourage researchers and development engineers to share nanotech electrical measurement techniques that will help the industry at large. The editors of R&D Magazine will judge the contest entries. Three prizes will be awarded: 1st Place - $2,500; 2nd Place - $1,500; and 3rd Place - $1,000.

Honeywell announced that global consulting firm Frost and Sullivan has honored the company with its 2006 Product Innovation Leadership of the Year Award in the industrial automation and process control space. The award is presented each year to the company that has best demonstrated the ability to develop and/or advance products with more innovative capabilities than competing vendors.

Beginning with this release, GE Fanuc will turn out a regular pulse of new tools, utilities and add-ins for its HMI/SCADA products in the form of Productivity Packs available to its Proficy GlobalCare customers.

Mike Fahrion was recently promoted to Director of Engineering. Joining B&B Electronics as an electrical engineer, Fahrion subsequently served as Director of Engineering and most recently as the company's Director of Marketing. "Having directed both of these major departments at B&B Electronics, Mike Fahrion is poised to move the company forward, applying a major focus on innovative new product development," says Wiencek.

Within the framework of the agreement, B&R is to supply innovative panel PCs from the Power Panel series to BMW's international production sites and system partners until at least 2013.

PlantWeb uses a FOUNDATION Fieldbus network of intelligent devices and Emerson's DeltaV digital system to provide an operational overview of the Phase III platform, which is monitored by engineers and operators at the main manned complex 10 km away, on the Champion West Drilling Platform - 1 (CWDP-1). The Phase III platform installation also features remote control and monitoring from Onshore Control Centre, in Brunei.

Competitive Advantages for Early Adopters.” The white paper explains how intelligent safety systems can increase machine uptime and limit liability as today’s manufacturing engineering organizations become more aware of the strategic value of safety.

A longtime leader in end-user vision systems, NI now adds support for GigE Vision cameras to its existing image acquisition software. With NI Vision Acquisition software, engineers can acquire images from thousands of different cameras and seamlessly move between standard vision buses including IEEE 1394a, IEEE 1394b, Camera Link and analog.

The permanent mold casting cells will utilize a KUKA robot and are designed to complete multiple casting tasks such as furnace and casting tending, sawing, sanding, milling/drilling, inspection and machining.

Matrix Electronica will distribute Imsys’ line of Java-enabled microcontrollers, prototyping kits, modules and development tools throughout their channels in Europe. Matrix has offices in Spain, Portugal and France.

The solution includes process data acquisition, control system performance analysis, process monitoring and advanced control technology components. The original contract to implement the solution at 50 plants has been completed.

The CIP Motion Drive Profile establishes the technical foundation for the implementation of multi-axis, synchronized motion control on EtherNet/IP™, the world's most developed, proven and complete industrial Ethernet protocol. The CIP Motion Drive Profile supports a range of drive types from variable frequency drives to high performance servo drives.

The charter stakeholders of The Automation Federation began the formal organizational process with meetings at the ISA President’s Spring Meeting last week in Orlando. Representatives of OMAC, WBF, and ISA met to sign incorporation documents, discuss initial strategic initiatives, and outline next steps.

To further this agreement, USCAR is proceeding with specific initiatives to accelerate its adoption in the U.S. vehicle assembly operations of its three member companies – DaimlerChrysler Corporation, Ford Motor Company and General Motors Corporation.

AECI is owned by and provides wholesale power to six regional and 51 local electric cooperative systems in Missouri, northeast Oklahoma and southeast Iowa that serve more than 800,000 customers. The New Madrid plant is comprised of two 600-MW coal-based electric generating units. As a baseload plant, it is critical to AECI's mission of providing an economical and reliable power supply to member systems.

By creating new jobs and promoting the training of technical specialists and managers worldwide, the drive and control specialist has increased sales growth for the third straight period.

Opto 22, a developer and manufacturer of hardware and software for industrial automation, remote monitoring, data acquisition, and machine-to-machine (M2M) applications, has announced the release of the SNAP PAC Learning Center, an integrated set of Opto 22 hardware and software that provides all the tools needed to learn and train with Opto 22 SNAP Ethernet systems.

EtherNet/IP stands apart from other industrial Ethernet options as it uses the same standard TCP/IP protocol chips and wiring that are used for the Internet and in company business networks worldwide. This approach offers a myriad of benefits to automation users and vendors alike: low product development costs, ease of use, simple product and network integration and multi-vendor interoperability, delivering far more than a fieldbus ever could.

The CIP Safety protocol for EtherNet/IP meets the requirements of IEC 61508 up to Safety Integrity Level 3 (SIL 3/Cat.4) and establishes the technical foundation for the implementation of CIP Safety on EtherNet/IP, the world's most developed, proven and complete industrial Ethernet protocol.

A live demonstration with the first device implementations of this C2C profile was presented at the joint booth of the Interests Group SERCOS interface. The product spectrum for SERCOS III continues to increase and currently includes over 20 innovative products. Additional companies have announced they will support and implement SERCOS III as a universal real-time interface. The first users, e.g., Schuler – one of the technological and global market leaders in the metalforming field, are already successfully applying SERCOS III solutions.

The profile defines mechanisms to interconnect distributed control functions and to synchronize distributed motion controls in modular machines and systems via the SERCOS III interface. The specification takes into consideration innovative SERCOS III features, such as hardware redundancy, hot-plugging and cross communication.

The free, one-day seminars for potential users and vendors of EtherNet/IP products and networks will be held at various locations around the world. The seminar titled “EtherNet/IP: The Proven and Complete Solution for Manufacturing Automation” will present the value proposition of implementing EtherNet/IP industrial networks. The first seminar in this series was given during ODVA’s 2006 CIP Networks Conference & 11th Annual Meeting in Phoenix, Arizona, USA.

During 2005, worldwide turnover amounted to 151 million euros. This continued success is due in large part to constant product development, introduction of several new products and aggressive expansion of the Beckhoff international sales and distribution network.

Adept Technology, Inc. (Nasdaq:ADEP) today announced the results of operations for its third quarter of fiscal 2006 which ended April 1, 2006. Revenues were $15.1 million and GAAP earnings were $1.3 million or $0.20 per basic share outstanding, as compared with revenues of $13.0 million and earnings of $292,000 or $0.05 per basic share for the third quarter of 2005. Revenues for the nine months ended April 1, 2006 were $42.7 million and GAAP earnings were $1.4 million, or $0.23 per basic share, as compared with revenues of $36.1 million and earnings of $392,000 or $0.06 per basic share for the same period of the prior year.

The four power plants are: Ping Wei Plant #2 at Huai Nan city in An Hui province; Huang Gang Da Bie Shan plant at Ma Cheng city in Hu Bei province; Yao Meng Plant #2 at Ping Dingshan city in He Nan province, and Qing He plant at Tie Ling city, Liao Ning province.

Intermec received special recognition for development of its Intellibeam EL10 barcode scan engine, the only ADC scan engine to use MEMS-based technology. MEMS, or micro-electromechanical systems, technology is used in mission-critical applications such as vehicle airbag and braking systems.

Schneider Electric shareholders met in Annual and Extraordinary Meeting yesterday, primarily to hear the report of the Board of Directors, approve the financial statements for 2005 and modify the governance mode of the company in order to set up a Management Board and a Supervisory Board. The Meeting was chaired by Henri Lachmann, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer.

This cooperation will focus on two key issues: ³grounding and shielding² and ³device diagnostics profiles.² These topics have been identified by both parties as areas that require further clarification and guidance particularly benefiting end users within the process industries across the EMEA region.

The ISA-99 Part 1 standard, "Security for Industrial Automation and Control Systems: Concepts, Terminology and Models," will define the concepts, terminology, and models of industrial automation and control systems security, establishing the basis for the remaining standards in the ISA-99 series.

Adept Technology, Inc., announced the election of Herb Martin as a member of the Adept Board of Directors. Mr. Martin has twenty years experience as a chief executive of high technology companies. Currently he is Chief Executive Officer of D-Wave Systems, Inc., a privately held company based in Vancouver, BC, and a leader in the development of quantum computing systems. Prior to D-Wave, Mr. Martin has been CEO and handled marketing roles in a public semiconductor company and various software companies with geographic expertise in Asia.