by Gary Mintchell | Feb 23, 2018 | Asset Performance Management, Automation, Security
Cybersecurity, digitalization, and asset performance management headlined the various press events with Schneider Electric at the recent ARC Forum. I took notes from Kim Cousteau’s presentation on APM at the main press conference and expected a follow up press release for details. I have not received one yet.
Remember the “reverse acquisition” of Aveva where Schneider Electric placed all of its software divisions into Aveva and then took a 60% share in the company? The deal is about to close. Schneider spokespeople assured me that digitalization is proceeding apace with the leveraging of Aveva design through construction applications into operations and maintenance applications—Schneider’s strong suit. This, on paper, brings the company into the competitive marketplace with Siemens and its UGS acquisition of several years ago. This is an interesting area to watch.
Schneider called a special press event, with lunch, to talk specifically about cybersecurity. This response to an incident in which the company’s Triconex safety system earned some publicity—but not always accurately portrayed. The incident was a cyber attack that caused a situation that the safety system caught and initiated a safe shut down.
However, the event caused renewed concern for cyber defense. ARC Vice President, Larry O’Brien, said, “This is a wake up call for people to follow existing security standards.” Gary Freburger, who heads that division of Schneider, said, “It’s everybody’s job.”
We received this official statement from Peter Martin, vice president of business innovation and marketing, Schneider Electric
At Schneider Electric, we heartily encourage all collaborative efforts to strengthen cybersecurity. The growing problem of cybersecurity is not specific to any single company, institution or country. Rather, it’s a threat to business and public safety that can only be addressed and resolved when suppliers, customers, integrators, developers, standards bodies and government agencies work together. This collaboration starts with common standards, agreed-upon rules, appropriate funding and active cooperation. It extends beyond national borders and transcends competitive interests.
Schneider Electric continues to work diligently with our customers, partners, developers and industry peers to make the shift from reactive to proactive cybersecurity management through compliance with evolving industry standards, agreement that cybersecurity is a journey not a destination, and a commitment to standing together in the face of cyber threats.
Today, we commend the signatories to the “Charter of Trust.” It’s another important step toward ensuring that the promise of digital transformation and automation will prevail over the threat of cyberterrorism.
Regarding APM, Kim Cousteau discussed a new release of Avantis that expanded machine learning from the power industry to oil & gas. For maintenance, it incorporates a team system for operator rounds and improved workflow. It incorporates augmented reality and virtual reality (AR/VR) “because workers are so new and need help to get up to speed. Look for updated analytics to aid in catching anomalies ahead of failure. She cited a customer who has been tracking savings from this feature alone and is up to $65 million.
by Gary Mintchell | Feb 22, 2018 | Automation
Today’s news from the ARC Forum concerns AspenTech and Emerson as we focus on process systems and asset optimization.
Only a few years ago it appeared that AspenTech was destined for some sort of demise—sold for parts or something. It has rebounded nicely since and last week announced enhancements to its production optimization solution and this partnership with Emerson. Collaboration being one of the sub-themes of the conference.
Emerson and AspenTech have teamed up to deliver asset optimization software solutions along with global automation technologies and operational consulting services.
AspenTech’s asset optimization supports Emerson’s Project Certainty and Operational Certainty initiatives. “Emerson’s global footprint, automation engineering services and software, extensive large-scale project execution and consulting capabilities complement AspenTech’s technology footprint. Collectively, these capabilities can be deployed as solutions in both conventional and cloud-based architectures.”
“Emerson and AspenTech are both highly focused on digital technologies and services that deliver measurable improvements and value to our customers’ bottom line,” says David N. Farr, chairman and CEO of Emerson. “Together, we are well positioned to help our customers navigate the best path in this era of digital transformation and achieve Top Quartile performance.” Top Quartile is defined as achieving operations and capital performance in the top 25 percent of peer companies.
The alliance will initially focus on three key areas: engineering software, including high-fidelity simulation to help validate project design and train operators before start-up; manufacturing and supply chain software, including advanced process control software designed for highly complex operations; and asset performance management software to improve plant reliability.
“Working with Emerson, we will help more organizations drive higher total shareholder returns with a relentless focus on operational excellence,” says Antonio Pietri, president and CEO of AspenTech. “We look forward to helping make the best companies even better by optimizing the design, operation and maintenance lifecycle with software and insight to run assets faster, safer, longer and greener.”
Emerson Updates
Meanwhile, Emerson hits themes of security, close to the edge (of the network), and OPC UA among many updates to its process automation system. It is expanding its Plantweb digital ecosystem with the launch of DeltaV version 14, a cybersecurity-certified control system designed to deliver new value in capital projects and make plant operations more connected and productive. The latest release provides significant innovations to the entire DeltaV architecture and was built with customers’ digital transformation initiatives in mind.
This major update to the DeltaV automation system includes several enhancements to eliminate costs and reduce complexity in capital projects, plus improve productivity during operations through enhanced access to production and equipment data, improved usability and greater security.
“More than ever, an integrated plant data environment is essential to achieve digital transformation. With DeltaV, we’re reducing the engineering effort required to securely connect plant, operational and information systems,” said Jamie Froedge, president of Process Systems and Solutions, Emerson Automation Solutions. “Our customers will have more capabilities in their distributed control and safety systems to help them successfully execute capital projects and optimize operations.”
Capital Project Flexibility
Continuing to advance the impact of DeltaV Electronic Marshalling with CHARMs on capital project engineering, CHARM I/O Block takes CHARMs—which achieved more than one million deployments at more than 1100 sites in only five years—closer to the field. Small enclosures with up to 12 CHARMs can now be installed closer to field devices, significantly reducing wiring and overall installation costs by as much as 60 percent and providing more engineering flexibility.
Smart Commissioning, launched in 2016, took one of most engineering intensive operations off a project’s critical path. Traditionally, commissioning has been a manual task that requires more than two hours per device for thousands of devices. Smart Commissioning reduced commissioning time to 25 minutes. Emerson is now expanding these capabilities and reducing device commissioning time to as little as 10 minutes, a nearly 93 percent reduction in costly commissioning time that could save several hundred-thousand dollars in engineering costs.
Mobility and User Experience
DeltaV Live Operator Interface is a modern, built-for-purpose operations experience that is easy to understand and modify. The HMI comes pre-engineered with the industry’s best practices for user experience including ISA 101.01 and is based on research with the Center for Operator Performance, a consortium of vendors and academia focused on human factors engineering. The HTML5 interface enables scalable graphics and gives operators the flexibility to adjust their displays to focus on process data that is most important for each situation. The new operator interface helps improve overall situational awareness and decision-making speed. Emerson is helping companies prepare for the shift to mobility with DeltaV Live by building a foundation for graphics to be transferrable across desktops, laptops, and mobile devices—all without additional engineering or custom scripting.
A Secure, Connected Plant
DeltaV will offer its users a new level of confidence and protection from cybersecurity threats by being one of the only systems to have a top-to-bottom cybersecurity certification. DeltaV v14 will be certified ISASecure SSA Level 1 by the International Society of Automation (ISA), signifying that Emerson developers are trained to write secure code and the system as a whole is hardened against cyber threats.
Emerson is making connecting a plant’s OT systems with IT systems seamless by expanding OPC UA access in its DeltaV hardware and software offerings. DeltaV is the pathway for most plant data and now using the IIoT’s most prevalent protocol, OPC UA, DeltaV applications and servers can securely share data to cloud analytics applications, remote monitoring solutions, and third-party technologies.
by Gary Mintchell | Nov 2, 2017 | Internet of Things, Manufacturing IT, Operations Management, Operator Interface, Software, Technology
Gathering data, visualization on many devices and screens, and connecting with standards including OPC UA and BACnet attracted a crowd of developers and users to the Iconics World Wide Customer Conference this week in Providence, RI.
“Connected Intelligence is our theme at this year’s summit and it has a dual meaning for us,” said Russ Agrusa, President and CEO of Iconics. “First, it refers to our extensive suite of automation software itself and how it provides out-of-the-box solutions for visualization, mobility, historical data collection, analytics and IIoT. The second point is that Iconics, over the last 30 years, has built a community of partners and customers who will have the opportunity to meet our software designers and other employees and have one-on-one discussions on such topics as; Industry 4.0, IIoT, cloud computing, artificial intelligence (AI) and the latest advances in automation software technology. It is truly a high energy and exciting event.”
Key technologies showcased at the Iconics Connected Intelligence Customer Summit included:
1. Industry 4.0 and the Industrial Internet of Things
2. Unlocking data and making the invisible, visible
3. Secure strategies and practices for industrial, manufacturing and building automation
4. Predictive AnalytiX using expert systems such as FDD and AI Machine Learning
5. Hot, warm and cold data storage with plant historians for the cloud and IIoT
Integration With AR, VR, and Mixed Reality Tech
The recent v10.95 release of GENESIS64 HMI/SCADA and building automation suite includes 3D holographic machine interface (HMI), which can be used with Microsoft’s HoloLens self-contained holographic computing device. This combination of Iconics software with Microsoft hardware allows users to visualize real-time data and analytics KPIs in both 2D and 3D holograms. When combined with Iconics AnalytiX software, users can take advantage of additional fault detection and diagnostics (FDD) and Hyper Historian data historian benefits, providing needed “on the spot” information in a hands-free manner.
“These new hands-free and mixed reality devices enable our customers and partners to ‘make the invisible visible’,” said Russ Agrusa, President and CEO of ICONICS. “There is a massive amount of information and value in all that collected and real-time data. Data is the new currency and we make it very easy to uncover this untapped information. We welcome this year’s summit attendees to get a glimpse at the future of HMI wearable devices such as Microsoft’s HoloLens and RealWear HMT1, HP and Lenovo Virtual reality devices.”
Mobile-Head-mounted tablet-style device
The V10.95 release of GENESIS64 HMI/SCADA and building automation suite includes Any Glass technology, which can be used with self-contained head-wearable computing devices. HMT-1 from RealWear demonstrated the visualization of real-time and historical data KPIs with voice driven, hands-free usage.
Featuring an intuitive, completely hands-free interface, the RealWear HMT-1 is a rugged head-worn solution for industrial IoT data visualization, remote video collaboration, technical documentation, assembly and maintenance instructions and streamlined inspections right to the eyes and ears of workers in harsh and loud field and manufacturing environments.
Support for multiple OSs and devices
Iconics has always been Microsoft Windows application and will continue to do so. However, IoTWorX Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT) software automation suite includes support for multiple operating systems including Windows 10 IoT Enterprise and Windows 10 IoT Core, as well as a large variety of Linux embedded operating systems including Ubuntu and Raspbian.
Users can connect to virtually any automation equipment through supported industry protocols such as BACnet, SNMP, Modbus, OPC UA, and classic OPC Tunneling. Iconics’ IoT solution takes advantage of Microsoft Azure cloud services to provide global visibility, scalability, and reliability. Optional Microsoft Azure services such as Power BI and Machine Learning can also be integrated to provide greater depth of analysis.
The following Operating systems are currently being certified for IoTWorX:
• Windows 10 IoT Enterprise
• Windows 10 IoT Core
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux 7
• Ubuntu 17.04, Ubuntu 16.04, Ubuntu 14.04
• Linux Mint 18, Linux Mint 17
• CentOS 7
• Oracle Linux 7
• Fedora 25, Fedora 26
• Debian 8.7 or later versions, openSUSE 42.2 or later versions
• SUSE Enterprise Linux (SLES) 12 SP2 or later versions
Hot, Warm, Cold Data Storage
Hyper Historian data historian integrates with and supports Microsoft Azure Data Lake for more data storage, archiving and retrieval.
When real-time “hot” data is collected at the edge by IoT devices and other remote collectors, it can then be securely transmitted to “warm” data historians for mid-term archiving and replay. Hyper Historian now features the ability to archive to “cold” long-term data storage systems such as data lakes, Hadoop or Azure HD Insight. These innovations help to make the best use of historical data at any stage in the process for further analysis and for use with machine learning.
Analytics
Among the new analytical features are a new 64-bit BridgeWorX64 data bridging tool, a new 64-bit ReportWorX64 reporting tool, several new Energy AnalytiX asset performance charts and usability improvements. In addition, Iconics has introduced a new BI Server.
• AnalytiX-BI – Provides data aggregation using data modeling and data sets
• ReportWorX64 – Flexible, interactive, drag & drop, drill-down reporting dashboards
• BridgeWorX64 – Data Bridging and with drag-and-drop workflows that can be scheduled
• Smart Energy AnalytiX – a SaaS based energy and facility solution for buildings
• Smart Alarm AnalytiX – a SaaS based alarming analysis product that uses EEMUA
by Gary Mintchell | Oct 27, 2017 | Internet of Things, Manufacturing IT, Operations Management, Software
GE Digital continues to build out its platform and ecosystem of applications while new GE CEO John Flannery confirmed his commitment to the digitalization strategy begun under his predecessor.
The sixth Minds + Machines conference featured about 90% growth in attendance from last year. Begun five years ago not long after the company began assembling its digital strategy as a thought leadership gathering, the conference has evolved into a substantial user conference. Attendance was reported at about 3,700 filling much of Moscone Center West in San Francisco.
I’ve summarized the announcements from the event below. My initial takeaway for the biggest news of the day was GE’s emphasis on building a partner ecosystem. As the company built out its Predix platform, it seemed to be on a track for keeping everything close to home. Saying that they could move more quickly to market, they talked about working more with partners. One executive told me that the partnership with Microsoft for Predix on Azure was the most significant announcement of the week.
This is my first time here and reinforces the idea that GE Digital is a major player in the industry segment begging comparison with Siemens. Some thought also ABB (they should not have forgotten Schneider) also.
Most of my discussions involved Asset Performance Management, the new Operations Performance Management (see below), and helping me understand Predix.
Following is a summary of announcements:
Flannery touched on some statistics from a survey concerning the “digital gap” of perceived importance of a digital transformation and how far along companies are.
GE Digital Industrial Evolution Index
The inaugural Index reflects a total score of 63 on a scale of 100 and indicates that while outlook for the Industrial Internet is very strong, scoring 78.3 (out of 100), company readiness significantly lags, scoring 55.2 (out of 100). This disconnect – between outlook and company readiness – presents both a challenge and opportunity for companies seeking to benefit from the IIoT. 86% believe digital industrial transformation is important to the competitiveness of their companies, with the majority (76%) rating the ability to provide higher quality services as the foremost outcome of digital industrial transformation.
GE unveiled expansions to its suite of edge-to-cloud technologies and industrial applications.
Edge-to-Cloud Intelligence on Any Industrial Asset, Anywhere
GE Digital is expanding its Predix Edge capabilities to help run analytics as close to the source of data as possible. Predix Edge gives customers with limited connectivity, latency limitations, regulatory or other constraints a way to deploy applications closer to the originating data.
Enhancements include:
• Predix Edge Manager allows customers to support large fleets of edge devices – up to 200,000 connected devices from a single console.
• Predix Machine enables microservice-based applications to run at the edge on customers’ virtualized data center infrastructure or on server-class hardware from GE or its partners. This also supports Predix Edge Manager, which was previously available only as a cloud service.
• Predix complex event processing (CEP) allows for faster and more efficient analytics and other event processing at extreme low latency, available at the edge in Q1 2018.
Predix Platform on Microsoft Azure
Announced last year and available generally in 2018, GE Digital and Microsoft partnership extends the accessibility of Predix to Microsoft’s global cloud footprint, including data sovereignty, hybrid capabilities and advanced developer and data services, enabling customers around the world to capture intelligence from their industrial assets.
Operations Performance
Alongside its Asset Performance Management (APM) software, the core application, GE Digital introduced Operations Performance Management (OPM), a solution helps industrials optimize the throughput of industrial processes.
OPM uses real-time and historical data – along with advanced analytics – to help customers make better operational decisions. The solution provides an early warning if industrial processes deviate from plan, arms operators with the information and time to troubleshoot operational issues and helps them take preventative actions to meet business goals. GE Digital’s OPM software initially targets the mining industry and will expand to additional industries early next year.
Enhanced Field Service Management Solutions
With service technicians looking to embrace technology to improve their productivity and deliver a better experience for customers, ServiceMax from GE Digital announced several enhancements to its FSM suite – enabling even greater efficiencies and bringing advanced analytics to service operations.
• Artificial intelligence-enabled predictive service times now integrate the Apache Spark AI engine to improve service time estimates.
• Additionally, a new application integration solution enables service providers to launch and share FSM data with third-party mobile applications installed on the same device.
• New capabilities in schedule optimization allow for dependent job scheduling between work orders for multiple visits aimed at improving first-time fix rates.
Predix Studio
GE Digital also introduced Predix Studio to help companies build and scale their own industrial applications and extend its Asset Performance Management (APM) suite. Available in Q1 2018, Predix Studio simplifies the development process by giving customers the ability to extend applications and empower industrial subject matters experts to build apps in a low-code, high-productivity environment.
Digital Twin Analytics Workbench
A solution that applies a library of algorithms and templates to make it faster and easier for companies to build their own digital twins on Predix. The Analytics Workbench, currently a technology preview from GE Power, can be used to augment existing digital twins with new data streams. For example, power producers using drones to inspect wind turbine blades, pipelines or fuel reserves can integrate visual inspection data into the digital twins they already use to manage generation assets and grid infrastructure.
by Gary Mintchell | Oct 17, 2017 | Operations Management, Software
Schneider Electric Software boosts Asset Performance, pricing model, and cloud offering. They called it a Schneider Electric Software Innovation Summit in San Antonio a couple of weeks ago. But as we know, that part of Schneider Electric is moving over to the new AVEVA which will be 60% owned by Schneider Electric. So, is this the last Schneider Electric Software summit, or will all the new company be absorbed at the conclusion of the buyout period?
I had committed to another conference by the time Schneider announced its software one, so I was not there. They did send news releases and I also talked with a friend who was there in order to gauge a little bit of what was happening. One other thing I find interesting. On the process automation side, they are clearly branding the legacy Foxboro name. On this side, not so much talk about Wonderware and Avantis. So I guess there is still some branding flux on the software side of the business.
Key takeaways: Schneider evidently saw a weakness in its asset performance management offering and has partnered with a European leader to add strength to it. Answering the challenge of a newer competitor regarding pricing for software, Schneider announced expansion of its subscription pricing model. The third larger announcement reflects the growing importance (and acceptance) of the Cloud for IT structure.
Short view of the news:
- Extends Enterprise APM Offering through New Partnership with MaxGrip: Schneider Electric has partnered with leader in Asset Performance Management (APM) software, MaxGrip, to deliver a more comprehensive asset lifecycle management offering. This expanded offering will include assessment services and risk-based maintenance capabilities, helping customers define and execute APM strategies for maximum return on assets.
- Extends Subscription Access Across Industrial Software Portfolio: Schneider Electric has expanded its subscription license model, enabling customers to purchase software licenses a la carte, providing greater value, new benefits and access to more industrial software applications than ever before. Subscription Access is now available when purchasing Engineering, Planning, Operations and Asset Performance, as well as Control and Information software solutions.
- Expands Cloud Platform with New Performance Module: Schneider Electric has announced the continued expansion of its Insight cloud platform, powered by Wonderware Online. The new Insight Performance Module provides Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) monitoring, asset utilization analysis and downtime tracking in the cloud to enable operational efficiency improvement while reducing total cost of ownership.
- Enhances Manufacturing Operations Management Offering for Mining Industry: Schneider Electric announced enhancements to its Manufacturing Operations Management (MOM) solution for the Mining industry. By introducing real-time production accounting and inventory management, the enhanced solution will improve decision support, planning and reporting capabilities for mining companies, enabling them to meet their digital transformation goals.
- Powers Roy Hill’s Remote Operations Center to Drive Digital Strategy: Schneider Electric announced the success achieved at independent iron ore operation in Western Australia – Roy Hill. By implementing Schneider Electric’s Mining industry software solution, Roy Hill has been able to consolidate end-to-end operational visibility and optimize its mining value chain.
- Drives Digital Transformation in Food & Beverage with New Industry Solutions: Schneider Electric announced three new solutions – Energy Performance, Advanced Process Control and Label Assurance – all aimed at solving industry challenges from growing environmental and sustainability regulations, higher energy costs, consumer demands and product quality and safety standards. The solutions empower F&B manufacturers to simultaneously improve efficiency, quality and performance by delivering real-time visibility, control and intelligence across operations and functional areas.
APM Offering
Schneider Electric announced a new partnership with MaxGrip that will enable a more comprehensive asset lifecycle management offering that includes assessment services and risk-based maintenance capabilities. This expanded offering will be available as part of Schneider Electric’s Enterprise Asset Performance Management (APM) solution.
This solution delivers a comprehensive view of asset health as a first step of an asset reliability strategy that takes into account business context to benchmark current performance and identify areas for improvement. Expert consultants will address a number of key areas of evaluation such as HSE (health, safety and environment), cost control, resource allocation, use of OT/IT systems and asset utilization. These insights will be translated into a pragmatic action plan to optimize production and improve margins while ensuring regulatory compliance.
As a result of this partnership, Schneider Electric can offer enhanced APM capabilities that allow customers to better strategize and optimize maintenance execution according to asset criticality for optimal business results. Risk analysis, what if analysis and asset management strategic review can provide detailed insight into asset reliability and performance, facilitating long-term strategic planning. Users can optimize operations by eliminating reoccurring incidents with root cause analysis, inventory management and strategy simulations to identify hidden inefficiency and drive value across the enterprise. An extensive library of asset reliability data and templates allows up to 90% faster time to deployment.
Subscription Access Across Industrial Software Portfolio
An expansion of the company’s subscription license model – Subscription Access – includes greater value, new benefits and access to more industrial software applications. Customers choosing this offering can benefit from reduced upfront costs, ease of license fee management, access to exclusive products, bundled capabilities and a lower total cost of ownership. Subscription Access is now available when purchasing Engineering, Planning, Operations and Asset Performance, as well as Control and Information software solutions.
Expands Cloud Platform with New Performance Module
Continued expansion of its cloud platform, Insight, powered by Wonderware Online, with new Insight Performance module that provides Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) monitoring, asset utilization analysis and downtime tracking in the cloud.
This Software as a Service (SaaS) offering offers the following capabilities:
- Light-weight applications that are easier to install, configure and maintain
- Virtually no on-premise servers or hardware requirement
Enhances Manufacturing Operations Management Offering for Mining Industry
The company announced enhancements to its Manufacturing Operations Management (MOM) solution for the Mining industry. This initiative can help optimize the mining supply chain, drive efficiency and maximize utilization of all operating assets, resulting in better profitability.
This data, when made available to domain-specific decision support tools and integrated with supply chain and enterprise resource planning systems, unlocks new levels of intelligence to drive continuous improvement. Eliminating manually entered production values while breaking down pervasive operational data silos can minimize time, errors and costs associated with manual and duplicate data-entry, further enhancing agility and efficiency.
Select improvements of Schneider Electric Software’s MOM solution for the Mining industry include:
- User selectable point in time feature for ‘Inventory data reprocessing’
- Data reprocessing has improved performance by 4X
- New “Calculated Inventory” feature to define custom calculations on captured inventory data
- Ampla Planner, Gantt Chart usability and user experience enhancements
- Client response times has improved performance by 2X
- Wonderware Online InSight connectivity
Powers Roy Hill’s Remote Operations Center
The company announced the success achieved at Roy Hill, an independent iron ore operation in Western Australia. Roy Hill implemented a Schneider Electric Mining industry software solution to consolidate end-to-end operational visibility and optimize their mining value chain.
Roy Hill built a greenfield iron ore mine and mine process plant in the Pilbara region, a heavy haul railway system from mine-to-port, new port facilities in Port Hedland, and a Remote Operations Center (ROC) in Perth. Each of these infrastructure components were designed to meet its capacity of 55 million tonnes per annum (Mtpa) of iron ore.
Most leading mining companies have historically evolved with organizational silos, usually between mines, processing facilities and logistics. In the age of increasing automation, data, and digitalization, these silos often prevent end-to-end visibility and optimization opportunities to realize resource to market potential. Through its efforts, as no small accomplishment, Roy Hill has been able to avoid these pitfalls with the help of its ecosystem partners, including Schneider Electric.
Roy Hill implemented Schneider Electric’s industrial software offering tailored for the mining industry, which included the following specific solutions:
- Demand Chain Planning and Scheduling (DCPS)
- Inventory Tracking and Quality Management (ITQM)
- Delay Accounting (DA)
- Capacity Simulation Model (Pre-CAPEX Analysis)
Drives Digital Transformation in Food & Beverage
Three new Food and Beverage manufacturing solutions were announced as part of the company’s ongoing effort to drive operational excellence, efficiency and performance while enabling regulatory and food safety compliance.
Food and Beverage and Consumer Packaged Goods manufacturers face a number of challenges, which are potentially impacting profitability. Growing environmental and sustainability related regulations are resulting in higher energy costs. Product yields must continually be improved to meet an increasingly diverse set of consumer demands. Each of these industry challenges must be addressed while maintaining product quality and safety standards to avoid product recalls and ensure continued consumer trust and confidence.
Three new industry solutions from Schneider Electric can help manufacturers to address these challenges:
- Energy Performance – provides improved visibility into energy usage, enabling opportunities to reduce consumption and costs
- Advanced Process Control (APC) – allows manufacturers to improve yield and product quality by minimizing unpredictable variations in the drying process
- Label Assurance – ensures compliance through 100% label inspection checks; reduces recalls
These solutions empower Food and Beverage manufacturers to simultaneously improve efficiency, quality and performance by delivering real-time visibility, control and intelligence across all operations and functional areas.
