Repost, with comments: Empowering Shop-Floor Leaders to Optimize Energy Performance [DATA]

http://blog.lnsresearch.com/blog/bid/185439/empowering-shop-floor-leaders-to-optimize-energy-performance-data?source=Blog_Email_[Empowering%20Shop-Floo]

Energy management is a key component in optimizing the performance of your operations, as well as reducing the total cost of producing products.  Real-time energy management allows you to be more proactive and responsive to conditions that are out of norm, as well as to refine and improve consumption and compliance.

Wonderware understands the importance of energy management, and brought out two years ago its application, Corporate Energy Management.  Built on the real-time data platform of System Platform, CEM allows users to view real-time energy utilization, fed by a variety of meters and profiled in an interactive display.  It supports and reinforces corporate initiatives for #sustainability, compliance, and green initiatives.

News Release: ArchestrA Workflow 2012 R2

ArchestrA Workflow provides a platform for collaboration between people, equipment and systems. If you have processes that must be enforced--such as corrective action, quality remediation, lock out/ tag out or alarm management, for example, you can use ArchestrA Workflow to ensure that the operations are conducted in a safe and consistent manner.

This new release for ArchestrA Workflow includes enhancements to its mobile application, as well as support for virtualization--the stepping stone to the cloud.

The entire release is accessed here:
News Release

Managing the Bad Times Better with Workflow

by Jim Frider, product marketing manager, Invensys

 

Every industrial facility experiences unexpected downtime and damage to productive assets.  How your organization manages these “bad times” will help determine the performance of your facility and consequently its profitability for the year.  Many industrial companies compile detailed lists of possible failure modes and develop contingency procedures to effectively deal with each of them.  

Since many potential problems rarely happen, the experience of the operator comes into play.  More experienced operators have seen a broader range of problems and know what to do, while less experienced operators do not.  How do you make sure your contingency plans are followed by everyone, every time? 

Repost, with comments: CPG marketing differs for boomers and millennials

http://www.smartbrief.com/08/02/13/cpg-marketing-differs-boomers-and-millennials

An interesting commentary on the differences in buying habits of boomers and millenials--tried and true versus try anything.

How can we take this knowledge and better attract a new audience for our automation products?  I'd say, in the same way that they buy CPG products.  Tout the new stuff, versus the stuff we do now that highlights the safety, security, and standardization of our products.  Not that it's not important, but it doesn't tip the scale.  It's a given.

Apparently, the newer generation isn't afraid to try new things, make mistakes, push the envelope.  And that's great from an industry momentum perspective.  Because we have long been wrestling with an industry that is slow to change, and rightfully so, because productivity and lives have depended on that thoughtful, rational approach to process control and industrial automation.

This definitely has me thinking--mobility, cloud, usability of our apps--is that the way to go?
What do you think?  Let me know: maryanne.steidinger@invensys.com

ArchestrA Workflow from Wonderware Supports the Coolest New Tablets

by Jim Frider, Product Marketing Manager, Invensys

Everybody wants one.  Tablet computers are gaining popularity not only at home but at work too from CEO’s to field operators.  Why?  Because tablets are light, easy to use, and relatively inexpensive.  Plus they give you access to a world of information through a myriad of interesting and useful applications or apps.

Tablets are great for collaborating and keeping you informed while away from your office.  With most security concerns being addressed along with the ubiquitous of wireless networks, tablets are coming into their own as the mobile platform of choice for many workers.

This ability to stay connected provides a great opportunity for companies to improve worker productivity by allowing them to stay involved in important workflows regardless of their location.  For example, an operations manager within a manufacturing facility is attending a staff meeting.  Elsewhere in the plant a hazardous material spill occurs.  The Work Tasks app from Wonderware can help notify you of the spill and ask for your approval to take specific mitigation steps in real-time. 

Repost: "Quantum strategy" is the secret to Apple's success....with comments

in this article from Business Week, they discuss the strategy of being at two places at the same time:
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-07-31/what-do-apple-and-singapore-airlines-have-in-common-quantum-strategy

In Apple's case, this manifested itself in being the best at both innovative design and manufacturing.
It's an interesting concept.  We've always been taught to really be good at one thing--nail it--and that's not only acceptable, but the norm.  And here Apple goes again, toppling status quo and continuing its genius in marketing.

But looking deeper, isn't that really the foundation of marketing?  The 5 P's--Product, Place, Promotion, Price, Packaging?  To be good, you need to do all 5 in order to win.  Apple does all of them really well, and normally wins.  But these 5 aspects of getting a product to market still exist, and still must be considered to win.

Repost: Mobile Tops Desktop for Social Sharing

http://www.emarketer.com/Article/Mobile-Tops-Desktop-Social-Sharing/1010091

Interesting study: more social sharing is done with mobile devices than with PC's.  This to me means a couple of things: people don't have the time to read, or process long articles, they like "sound bites" and a mobile device is perfect for that; they use any spare time to browse and share; and we, as marketers, have the responsibility to present information succinctly, and in formats that can take advantage of the mobile format.

For industrial automation products, this is a growing market segment: mobility. Providing not only the applications that take advantage of the portable form factor, but present information, and allow you to interact with the software, in a natural and intuitive manner.  In the past few years, we've seen products such as our SmartGlance mobile reporting, and IntelaTrac mobile work force management software, be widely adopted by industries such as food and beverage, oil and gas, and refining.  It helps people with productivity, collaboration, and information management, without being behind a desk.  It maps the way people work, which is a good thing.