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IBG - SA Instrumentation & Control Buyers' Guide

January 2003 News

The annual silly-season has come to an end with some very interesting happenings on the e-business front. Some South African online sellers are reporting sales up by between 170 and 300% from the same time last year. Of course, a three-fold increase of 'not much' is still 'not very much', but the trend is nevertheless significant. As an aside these increases should also be seen in the perspective that global online sales still only account for 2,5% of total sales.

Most engineering staff still hold a rather sceptical view of e-business. They see it as a sales or marketing issue. In reality, whether we like it or not, the consumer or end-user is demanding to get closer and closer to the manufacturer. Those companies that choose not to allow a free flow of information to the consumer will find that their sales will suffer, and after all, the reason why we are in business is because of sales.

For some time the manufacturing industry has been subjected to increasing demands for transparency of data. Manufacturing Execution Systems (MES), Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) Systems, Supply Chain Management Systems (SCM) and a mass of other Three Letter Acronym (TLA) systems require to be fed with vast amounts of data in a seemingly never-ending effort to improve efficiencies and reporting systems.

On the subject of data and technology, the latest issues regarding the PC vs PLC debate are highlighted in our PLC feature in this issue. The encroachment of personal computer technology into not only our personal and office lives but also into the control environment has perhaps a brighter future with the stability improvements featured in the latest versions of Microsoft's operating systems. Sceptics may justifiably still choose to leave true realtime operations to dedicated PLCs, allowing PCs to manage the 'less critical' reporting and data management. Our more adventurous or progressive colleagues might choose to move the control into the realm of the PC. Whichever option you currently choose to employ, there is no doubt that data-transparency will become evermore important as businesses embrace the new economy.

The publisher of SA Instrumentation & Control, Technews, has announced that following the signing of a technology agreement between its Internet technology division, IQ Publishing Corporation, and The House of Synergy (THOS), Technews has made the strategic decision to relocate its primary webserver to a new Internet Service Provider (ISP). THOS will be taking over the administration of Technews' servers, as well as providing a conduit for further development of our online facilities. The relocation of the server to AT&T's server farm in Sandton, Johannesburg, has already seen a significant increase in performance for users both in southern Africa and abroad.

You can view all current and back-issues of SA Instrumentation & Control free of charge at www.instrumentation.co.za

Graeme Bell

Editor: SA Instrumentation & Control

[email protected]

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