Approximately 70 delegates, representing leading South African system integrators, will attend Futuristix-Wonderware’s SI Conference from 12–13 October 2002 at Roodevallei Country Lodge, Kameeldrift, Pretoria.
"In addition to holding our annual user conferences," says Mike le Plastrier, MD of Futuristix Advanced Control Systems, "we are unique in being the only company to hold a conference focusing solely on addressing the needs of system integrators. This is an indication of the wide acceptance of our expanding range of solutions across most areas of the manufacturing industry and manufacturing execution systems (MES) in particular."
In March this year, these same system integrators had the opportunity of sharing their accomplishments at Futuristix-Wonderware's User Conference at Sun City, an event attended by over 250 SA manufacturing and industrial automation professionals and overseas speakers. Now, it will be their turn to see what is emerging from the Wonderware solution development pipeline as well as from other solution developers such as MDT Software and Neumaflo Australia.
"Not only are existing solutions like InTouch, InControl, InTrack, QI Analyst, Avantis and others in a continuous process of enhancement to meet the needs of SIs and their end-users," continues le Plastrier, "but new and highly-significant products and releases such as ArchestrA, SuiteVoyager 2, InSQL 8.0, DT Analyst 2 with OEE, MASS AutoSave and ProDef help integrate and extend our solution offering to provide more end-user functionality across a wider MES application base."
Wonderware's ArchestrA framework reduces solution design delays by allowing OEMs and VARs to more readily build custom industrial market solutions through the addition of their domain expertise to existing solutions. "In a world where differences in manufacturing and production processes are as numerous and different as there are companies," says le Plastrier, "ArchestrA allows SIs to focus on adding their application expertise rather than fighting technology."
The new IndustrialSQL Server 8.0 release delivers enhanced performance, scalability and robustness for industrial automation users offering quality analysis, production analysis and tracking capabilities. Version 8.0 features ultra high availability and fault tolerance including the ability to protect against server or network hardware failure while providing dynamic re-configuration capabilities (no need to stop and restart). With its ability to acquire and store up to 60 000 samples per second for short durations and continuous sampling rate of 20 000 samples per second, Version 8.0 also delivers improved performance while its enhanced scalability of addressing installations with more than 100 000 tags, makes it ideal for the support of larger and more complex applications.
DT (DownTime) Analyst 2 now features OEE (overall equipment effectiveness) support. DT Analyst is a scalable solution that is designed to provide insight into the events that cause production systems or their components to stop functioning. Armed with detail cause and effect scenarios, Production Managers can quickly identify problem areas and take remedial action.
OEE is a system of measurement used by the world's leading manufacturers that allows managers to evaluate the true effectiveness and potential of existing plant before making decisions about expansion or the purchase of new plant. DT Analyst 2.0's OEE option provides for the tracking and reporting on OEE in realtime and historically. OEE is made up of availability, performance and quality information for individual lines or machines. DT Analyst 2.0's extensive 'out-of-the-box' reports and OEE charts give manufacturers valuable information for managing plant operations and for planning capital projects.
"Two significant new products that were not available at last year's SI conference," says le Plastrier, "are MASS AutoSave and ProDef. MASS AutoSave brings IT discipline to the shop floor through the formal management of PLC and HMI software releases and their back-up while ProDef helps SIs develop and document trouble-free control applications in record time and independently of any PLC or HMI."
All system integrators are welcome at this unique and informative two-day venue as well as at the golf day on 11 October.
Those wishing to attend the conference should contact Michelle Giammartini at Just Conferences, 011 723 9900.
For more information contact Mike le Plastrier, Futuristix, 011 723 9900, mike@futuristix.co.za, www.futuristix.co.za
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