by Gary Mintchell | May 4, 2015 | Automation, Data Management, Internet of Things, Manufacturing IT, Networking, News, Operations Management, Technology
For being so quiet for so long, the OPC Foundation is certainly hitting the news often lately. There was news about a couple of open-source initiatives. Then the Foundation itself opened up a little with an “open-shared” program.
Then it was announced as the communication platform of Industry 4.0 in Germany.
Now a couple European automation rivals—Beckhoff Automation (Germany) and B&R Automation (Austria)—have made OPC news.
Taken in sum, these announcements plus the earlier ones reveal the importance of OPC to industrial communication. It became a standard for moving important data from control systems to human-machine interface systems and then on to SCADA and MES systems.
With the introduction of UA built on modern software technologies including built-in security and embeddable format, the technology everyone used but also everyone dissed finds itself on the cutting edge of modern connected industrial Internet strategies.
OPC and Beckhoff
News coming from last month’s Hannover Messe included this joint announcement from OPC and Beckhoff.
OPC UA is about scalable communication with integrated security by design up to MES / ERP systems and into the cloud, EtherCAT is about hard real-time capability in machines and factory control systems. Both technologies complement each other perfectly.
Industrie 4.0 and Internet of Things (IoT) architectures require consistent communication across all levels while using Internet technologies: both in as well as outside of the factory, for example to cloud-based services. That exactly is what the OPC Foundation and the EtherCAT Technology Group (ETG) want to account for by defining a common definition of open interfaces between their respective technologies.
At the Hanover Fair Thomas J. Burke, President and Executive Director of the OPC Foundation and Martin Rostan, Executive Director of the ETG signed a Memorandum of Understanding in which both organizations agree to closely co-operate developing these interfaces.
OPC and B&R
Not to be outdone, B&R Automation issued a press release announcing it will be supporting the OPC Foundation’s new real-time technology working groups, whose goal is to add real-time capability to the OPCUA communication standard. This will involve two key additions to the OPCUA standard. The first is a publisher-subscriber model; the other is utilization of the IEEE 802.1 standard for time-sensitive networking (TSN).
B&R will be contributing its real-time expertise to the working groups. “The updates to the OPC UA standard will benefit from our years of experience in developing real-time solutions,” says Stefan Schönegger, marketing manager at B&R.
OPC UA uses a publish/subscribe network model. B&R is the main proponent of PowerLink. PowerLink uses publish/subscribe technology, too. So, B&R wants to show compatibility.
“This is a fundamental requirement for the M2M communication you find in integrated systems such as packaging lines,” explains Schönegger.
In order to fulfill real-time requirements, the OPC UA standard will make use of the IEEE 802.1 TSN standard. “At the moment, TSN is still a working title for a group of new IEEE standards designed to provide native real-time capability for the IEEE 802 Ethernet standard,” says Schönegger. This would allow for a seamless transition to substantially faster Ethernet standards such as POWERLINK for field-level communication and demanding motion control tasks.
Beyond the automation industry, TSN is currently also being evaluated by the automotive and telecommunications industries. “The first cars based on TSN are expected to hit the market in the very near future,” reports Schönegger. This would help secure the widespread availability of this technology. In addition to B&R, the new OPC working groups will be also supported by other leaders in the field of automation, as was announced by KUKA on April 13, 2015.
OPC UA already plays a central role in the IT-related areas of modern production systems. “The addition of TSN and the publisher-subscriber model will greatly expand the range of potential OPC UA applications,” says Schönegger.
Takeaway
What all this means is that OPC can now become even faster and more usable than before. The little protocol that everyone uses and everyone complains about is getting cred as it becomes more modern. These technological advances should make it more valuable. And that will be significant in this new connected enterprise era.
by Gary Mintchell | Jan 13, 2015 | Automation, Education, Internet of Things, Leadership, News, Operations Management, Software, Technology
Let the debates begin! Jim Pinto has published his 2015 prognostications in the latest JimPintoBlog.
Check out his entire list and enter your thoughts on his blog. I’ll highlight some of his thoughts and add some of my own.
Automation Industry Trends
New inflection points will change the leadership lineup.
GM—I do not expect big changes in the automation leadership lineup. Mitsubishi, Rockwell Automation and Siemens are dominant in their home areas and fighting it out in China and India. Siemens has a bit of an edge having been international for a longer period of time. But as automation commoditizes, perhaps some new entrants will grab some share. If Bedrock Automation can market well, watch out for it. On the process side, Invensys is gone, absorbed by Schneider Electric. So the process automation business becomes even more of a minor part of the overall businesses, like ABB, Emerson Process Management, and Yokogawa. The only interesting situation in that market area is Honeywell Process Solutions. But I don’t really expect any change there.
I think 3D printing (additive manufacturing) is a game changer and one of the most important things from last week’s CES. It’s not strictly automation, though.
From Jim:
- Internet of Things (IoT): The Industrial Internet will transform the next decade. Intelligent sensors and networks will take measurement and control to the next level, dramatically improving productivity and efficiencies in production. Growth in 2015 will be bottom-up, not top-down.
- Smaller, Cheaper Sensors: Everyone is looking for or working on smaller, cheaper sensors for widespread use in IoT. Expect fast growth for sensors this year.
- Cloud Computing: Cloud computing technology reduces capital expenditures and IT labor costs by transferring responsibility to cloud computing providers, allowing secure and fast access for data-driven decisions. The significant gains in efficiency, cost and capability will generate continuing rapid growth in 2015.
- 3D Printing in Manufacturing: Today, do-it-yourself manufacturing is possible without tooling, large assembly lines or multiple supply chains. 3D printing is reshaping product development and manufacturing.
- Mobile Devices in Automation: The use of WiFi-connected tablets, smartphones and mobile devices is spreading quickly. Handheld devices reduce costs, improve operating efficiency, boost productivity and increases throughput. More and more employers are allowing BYOD (bring your own device).
- Robotics: Millions of small and medium-sized businesses that will benefit from cheaper robots that can economically produce a wide variety of products in small numbers. The next generation of robots will be cheaper and easier to set up, and will work with people rather than replace them.
- Control Systems Security: In spite of apprehensions over consumer security breach events, industrial cyber security has mostly been ignored due to lack of understanding of solution costs. Many companies struggle to justify what is seen as added cost to secure their operation. Major security breaches will change this attitude.
Business Technology Trends
Gartner’s top trends for 2015 (3) cover three themes: the merging of the real and virtual worlds, the advent of intelligence everywhere, and the technology impact of the digital business shift. There is a high potential for disruption to the business with the need for a major investment, or the risk of being late to adopt.
Here are the top Gartner trends:
- Computing Everywhere: As mobile devices continue to proliferate, there will be increased emphasis on the needs of the mobile users. Increasingly, the overall environment will need to adapt to the requirements of the mobile user
- 3D Printing: Worldwide shipments of 3D printers are expected to grow 98 percent in 2015, followed by a doubling of unit shipments in 2016, reaching a tipping point over the next three years.
- Advanced, Pervasive and Invisible Analytics: The volume of data generated by embedded systems generates vast pools of structured and unstructured data inside and outside the enterprise. Organizations need to deliver exactly the right information to the right person, at the right time, so analytics will become deeply, but invisibly embedded everywhere.
- Smart Machines: Advanced algorithms will allow systems to understand their environment, learn for themselves, and act autonomously.
- Cloud Computing: The convergence of cloud and mobile computing will continue to promote the growth of centrally coordinated applications that can be delivered to any device. Applications will evolve to support simultaneous use of multiple devices.
- Risk-Based Security and Self-Protection: All roads to the digital future lead through security. Organizations will increasingly recognize that it is not possible to provide a 100 percent secured environment. They will apply more-sophisticated risk assessment and mitigation tools. Every app needs to be self-aware and self-protecting.
GM—My take is that the biggest thing in this area is analytics combined with improved visualizations and dashboards that take advantage of smartphones and tablets. Cloud is here. IoT is here. Security will forever be an important part of business.
2015 Consumer Electronics Show
- Wearable Devices: The time is right for wearable devices.
- Practical green tech.
- Sustainability and transportation: Tesla Model X all-electric SUV with the doors that open like a Delorean. Electric-assisted bike technology; electric scooter with swappable batteries and dashboard analytics.
- Kid-Tech: Apps to help teach children science, math, and tech. Fun little robots that teach kids computer programming concepts. Drawing, design, and color patterns to help kids learn about robotics and computer programming.
GM—as I’ve already written, autonomous vehicles could be a game changer and 3D printing was huge. The outlier is drones. Who knows where that might go?
Future Prognostications 2015-2025
Here are ten prognostications for the next decade, picked from the World Future Society (7) forecasts, plus other readings and discussions with Futurists.
- – Education: A major shift to on-line education and certification is already happening, and will continue steadily.
- – Jobs: Advances in artificial intelligence will eliminate human workers.
- – Robot Work Force
- – Middle Class Impasse: delaying retirement, income stagnating
- – Driverless cars
- – Speak to Computers.
- – Robotic Augmentation (exoskeletons)
- – Health & Well-being: sensors everywhere
- – Brain scanning will replace juries
- -Energy: Futurist Ray Kurzweil notes that solar power has been doubling every two years for the past 30 years while costs have been dropping. He says solar energy is only six doublings (less than 14 years) away from meeting 100% percent of energy needs.
GM-There are going to be some disruptions and huge benefits from a number of these. Autonomous vehicles and health advances are fantastic. I wish education would change more quickly that it does. Even those who wish to disrupt education mainly only have the political agenda of “teachers’ unions” and driving down salaries. (Why is it a political agenda to drive down salaries. Shouldn’t we be trying to improve everyone’s lot in life?)
I’m not a fan of Kurzweil. 100% is not realistic—maybe residential, but not everything. Don’t think there’s enough volts there!
I think we are going to need those labor-saving, productivity-enhancing advancements because we’re actually facing a labor shortage in 10 years. Time to start thinking farther ahead.
Humans have a way of adapting to thrive. I am optimistic about the future!
Yes, Jim, I’m with you there!
by Gary Mintchell | Oct 14, 2014 | News, Organizations
What a year for media coverage of the controls, instrumentation and automation industry.
I left Automation World last year to try some new things. I just felt the itch to be creative again. Then Walt Boyes left Control magazine and bought the Industrial Automation Insider (subscriptions only).
Then, within the past two weeks were two acquisition announcements.
PMMI, the Packaging Machinery Manufacturers Institute, acquired Summit Media Group–owner of Packaging World, Healthcare Packaging, and, oh yes, Automation World.
Now an entirely different association, ISA, has acquired Automation.com. The latter media company is digital only with a highly visited Website.
PMMI is an association of OEMs. ISA is an individual member organization. They are different types of organizations. But I’ll be interested to see how an association handles being a publisher.
I should point out that the ISA acquisition simply returns ISA to what it was before it downsized several years ago. ISA and Automation.com have had a close relationship, with the latter serving as the digital publishing arm of ISA.
With me writing at this media outlet, Walt with his new gig, Greg Hale (former editor in chief of Intech) now with his entrepreneurial effort at ISSSource, maybe things will get more interesting for readers. I hope so.
by Gary Mintchell | May 30, 2014 | Automation, Leadership, News, Organizations
I’m preparing for another trip to HUG—Honeywell User Group—but this time for the first time the conference will not be held in Phoenix. The members opted for San Antonio. That’s not the only change. Vimal Kapur has been named the new president of Honeywell Process Solutions this week. It seems like only yesterday, well 2012 I guess, when Darius Adamczyk was introduced as Honeywell Process president in place of Norm Gilsdorf, who had only shortly before replace Jack Bolick.
Gilsdorf had moved the headquarters to London from Phoenix causing a major turnover in senior staff. The HQ moved to Houston, and I see that it is staying there. This is a lot of turnover in a relatively short period of time. We usually think that stable leadership is essential to long-term growth. It will be interesting to see what they say about the changes.
The Honeywell release says Kapur is a near-30-year veteran of the process automation industry, with Honeywell for more than 25 years. He has held a number of key strategic business positions within Honeywell including vice president of Global Marketing and Strategy for HPS, and managing director for Honeywell Automation India Limited (HAIL). Prior to this appointment, he was vice president/general manager of the Advanced Solutions line of business for HPS.
Kapur graduated from Thapar Institute of Engineering in Patiala, India, as an electronics engineer with a specialization in instrumentation. He is Six Sigma certified for DMAIC and Growth.
He will be located in Houston, Texas.
by Gary Mintchell | Oct 31, 2013 | Commentary, News
I’ve had a bunch of things to report and analyze, just very little time. Travel and meetings are thought killers. Also, I try out so many tools that I sometimes sit and wonder whether to use my outliner (currently fargo.io from Dave Winer), or a text editor (recently I like Quip—quip.com–which is also a great collaboration tool) Quip or Write Pad or Write Room (never Word, by the way, too busy). Where do I store thoughts—outliner, Nozbe my GTD app or Evernote. I’m starting to settle into Nozbe just for GTD and lists, Quip for text, Fargo for longer things that need to be outlined.
Recently I talked with Bobby Bono, US Industrial Manufacturing Leader for PwC, about its latest Manufacturing Outlook survey and report. Notable are the comments about a skills gap.
I heard Rodney Brooks, founder of iRobot, talk about how we are asking the wrong question about whether automation (robots) are replacing jobs. That is very short-term thinking. In the longer term, we need to think about the skills shortage and people shortage as the later generations which are smaller in number than the boomer generation which is about to retire (although I figure I have a few years left).
This report, among other things, highlights that skills gap. Below is an edited version of the press release that went out regarding the report.
Optimism among U.S. industrial manufacturers regarding the global economic outlook reached the highest level since the first quarter of 2012, according to the Q3 2013 Manufacturing Barometer, released today by PwC US. In the third quarter of 2013, 40 percent of respondents expressed optimism regarding the world economy for the next 12 months, up from 31 percent in the prior quarter and 29 percent from the third quarter of 2012.
The primary growth driver remains the U.S. economy, with 60 percent expressing optimism about the domestic outlook. In addition, 78 percent believe the U.S. economy grew in the third quarter, up six points from the prior quarter and representing the highest level since 2006. The outlook for the U.S. continues to contrast with the international picture, where optimism regarding actual revenue contributions in the next 12 months remained low at 30 percent, down two points from the second quarter and off eight points from last year’s third quarter.
“The divergence in viewpoints regarding the U.S. and world economic outlooks narrowed somewhat in the third quarter. Optimism regarding the global economy improved, but uncertainty remained prevalent, marked by persistently low expectations regarding the level of international revenue contributions going forward,” said Bono. “Despite the uptick in global economic sentiment, the U.S. remains the growth driver in the industrial manufacturing sector, with continued signs of healthy demand, pricing strength, new product investment and hiring. Overall top line growth expectations remain moderate and management teams are continuing to take a careful approach to capital allocation and cost management, while preserving liquidity.”
Reflecting the healthy level of optimism pertaining to the domestic economy, 82 percent of U.S. industrial manufacturers surveyed expect positive revenue growth for their own companies in the next 12 months, with only two percent forecasting negative growth. The projected average revenue growth rate over the next 12 months remained moderate at 4.2 percent, down from 4.6 percent in the second quarter and last year’s third quarter. Only seven percent forecast double-digit growth, while 75 percent expect single digit growth.
With regard to capital spending, 48 percent of industrial products manufacturers surveyed plan major new investments of capital during the next 12 months, up eight points from the prior quarter’s 40 percent, and on par with a year ago (49 percent). The mean investment as a percentage of total sales was 6.5 percent, higher than the prior quarter’s four percent, and representing the highest level in the past nine quarters.
Plans for operational spending also rose. Looking at the next 12 months, 78 percent of respondents plan to increase operational spending, up five points from the second quarter. Leading increased expenditures were new product or service introductions at 55 percent, up 10 points from the second quarter and representing the highest level in the past seven quarters. This was followed by research and development (R&D) (38 percent) and information technology (35 percent). Plans for new joint ventures and strategic alliances also rose, while spending forecasts for M&A and overseas expansion remained low. In fact, the number of respondents indicating the potential to acquire another business was 17 percent, less than half the level of last year’s third quarter.
“Management teams are continuing to focus on boosting organic growth, with an emphasis on new product launches and investment in R&D and technology,” Bono continued. “This is indicative of the mixed global outlook and overall moderate revenue growth expectations. In an uncertain environment, industrial manufacturers are managing risk and concentrating on strengthening their products and services. They are doubling down on what they do best in a quest to expand market share.”
The latest Barometer also showed that hiring plans are on the rise, with expectations reaching the highest level in five years and the second highest quarterly percentage in the past 10 years. The majority, 58 percent of U.S. industrial manufacturers surveyed, plan to add employees to their workforce over the next 12 months, up 16 points from second quarter 2013 estimates. Only three percent plan to reduce the number of full-time equivalent employees, and 39 percent will stay about the same. The most sought-after employees will be skilled labor (35 percent), professionals/technicians (35 percent), and production workers (30 percent).
Despite healthy hiring expectations, the survey identified headwinds in securing qualified workers. Three-fourths (77 percent) of respondents cited a need to fill certain skill gaps over the next 12-24 months, with only 23 percent claiming to have all the right skills needed at present. The biggest skill gaps were in middle management (70 percent) and skilled labor (67 percent). At the same time, half of U.S. industrial product organizations admitted to having open positions that they were unable to fill with skilled employees.
“In a limited job market, it is troublesome that three-fourths of panelists have reported a skill gap, with half of those companies acknowledging difficulty in filling these key positions,” Bono commented.
Regarding potential growth barriers over the next 12 months, legislative/regulatory pressures were the most cited at 58 percent. Lack of demand was the second most cited barrier at 45 percent, but it was down from 67 percent a year ago when it was the chief barrier to growth. Competition from foreign markets was also high at 32 percent. Other potential barriers on the rise in the third quarter included lack of qualified workers (22 percent), capital constraints (20 percent) and oil/energy prices (28 percent).
