For anyone in the automation and control industry the name Protea is well known. The company has been in the process control business in South Africa since 1947, the year it also began its continuing relationship with Foxboro in North America. As from the beginning of May this year, the restructured and refocused company was re-launched as Protea Automation Solutions that now incorporates AFH Devers and Protea Industrial Controls.
While the restructuring of Protea itself was driven by the needs of the local market and was personally overseen by the Managing Director, Eric Fisher, the changes were also influenced by those that had taken place over the last number of years at the company's long-standing principals.
The vision of the company is to be the most efficient and cost-effective supplier of control and automation solutions to industry, encompassing integration from the sensor level through to management information systems. To do this, the company represents leading international manufacturers and maintain skilled staff in the areas of primary measurement, automation, control and related management information systems.
Services offered include consulting, design, integration, engineering, installation, commissioning, maintenance, training and support. These can be on an ad hoc basis or as a full turnkey project and can include third party products. The company has a solid record of achievement in the turnkey projects and after-sales service arenas, which it is very proud of. It is virtually a one-stop-shop for industry's automation and control needs. To achieve this, the company's sales engineer and technical services contingent are kept up-to-date on the latest trends and developments through ongoing training. The company boasts some 940 years of cumulative experience of its staff in the control and automation market.
Protea Automation Solutions recently completed the implementation of a full-blown ERP system. This is a further step in ensuring that it has the appropriate systems to support the provision of professional services to its customers. Next in line is the implementation of a CRM package to ensure a holistic and pro-active interaction with its customer-base. This will naturally lead to full e-commerce capability and is all aimed at making the customers' interaction with the company easy and effective. The company already has video conferencing facilities which is utilised for meetings with principals and customers.
Instrumentation
In terms of instrumentation, Protea can offer a broad portfolio covering measurement of flow, pressure, temperature and level. Manufacturers represented include the likes of Fairchild (I/P converters, volume boosters, regulators), Eurotherm (PID controllers, thyristors), Chessell (data acquisition, recorders), Land (infrared thermal imaging, linescanning, thermometers), Hawk (ultrasonic and hydrostatic level and microwave switching), Foxboro (a full range of process control instrumentation) and others.
In terms of success stories and latest offerings
* Chessell has launched a paperless recorder which includes a high quality display and is configurable up to 36 channels.
* Land is becoming the line-scanning standard and is launching some exciting new products in September.
* Hawk boasts the highest-powered transducers on the market, making them suitable for applications where competitor products cannot cope.
The green issue
A major concern today on a worldwide basis is the protection of our environment and one of the new fields of activity for Protea is analytical measurement and control through the Metrisa group of companies (Tytronics, Nametre, Monitek), Maihak and LAR. It is expected that this will become a major growth area, and while the company has currently only installed systems to measure water-borne effluent (eg Iscor and AECI), there is increasing demand for gas and air monitoring. This need can be readily fulfilled with Maihak's state-of-the-art gas monitoring systems.
Intelligent Automation
As long ago as 1988, Foxboro launched the world's first open industrial system - which was a major advance on the legacy DCS systems - and has as its strength the ability to naturally evolve with developments in technology. This strength of system longevity is due to the fact that I/A was developed on industrial standards in terms of both software and hardware. It received acclaim 12 years after its launch in a US publication when it was referred to as still the most up-to-date system. This has been achieved through the use of its open architecture and its evolvement to accommodate other technological developments. As one example today, both operating systems such as Windows NT and Unix, can be used seamlessly on the same platform. I/A also offers a major advantage to any company in that it has no real defined life span (its evolution continues). According to Foxboro, it would require an unforeseen revolution in software or hardware to even put I/A (and thereby all other computer systems) on the road to obsolescence. I/A boasts the lowest total cost-of-ownership.
Foxboro is part of Invensys, which was the name adopted for the merged entity of Siebe Plc and BTR groups. Invensys derives from the words 'invention', 'innovation', 'system solutions'.
As a now important player in the industry, Invensys has set itself the goal of becoming the world's largest automation group, and in line with that target has made several other strategic acquisitions. These have included BAAN and Wonderware amongst others. Another offering from within Invensys is the Eurotherm Process Automation system which is a small-platform DCS system. Joint product integration and development has already commenced within Invensys such as the I/AWW (I/A Wonderware at Work) being a scalable solution aimed at the small end systems business.
Success stories
In terms of successes Protea has a long list of historical and recent plaudits. A notable installation of I/A was that at the Kynoch Fertiliser plant that upgraded from the older Foxboro SPEC 200 analog system. In an example of how easily I/A can be used to change from a legacy system the entire system at Kynoch was migrated on-line without any plant downtime.
In terms of aggressive environments, Protea refers to the I/A installation at Mossgas, operating tens of kilometres offshore. This is also one of the largest I/A systems in operation in South Africa. Yet another challenge was the Algorax carbon black plant where this conductive and pervasive material often caused electrical shorts in the legacy system. Here, the ruggedised Foxboro packaging really proved itself and the distributed I/O continues to operate throughout the plant in an unprotected environment.
As for reliability, the mining industry in Zambia is a particularly good example as there is a distinct lack of good housekeeping due mainly to shortage of technically skilled personnel. Here, a very early, but still extremely robust Foxboro I/A is still in daily use after more than 12 years.
Besides Mossgas, two of the largest installations of I/A to date, by Protea, are Lever Ponds and African Products, indicating that the Foxboro solution is equally at home in the fine chemicals and food industries.
The open approach
While Protea does offer a complete solution for industrial automation from within its own portfolio, the company's approach is to work with the customer to determine the most appropriate solution in each instance. As such, suitable instrumentation and peripherals from any manufacturer will be integrated into the I/A, EPA or other system, so the solution offered by Protea is truly product independent. This approach allows industry to choose open-compliant products most appropriate to their own processes where the normal offerings through Protea may be more generic.
Life-cycle costing
Protea Automation Solutions' MD, Eric Fisher, laments that companies today, while understanding the concept of life-cycle cost, still end up making their decisions based on up-front price of the system. It is in total life cycle cost that the Foxboro I/A system is truly competitive. In a landmark study conducted by the giant Eli Lilly Corporation about seven years ago, it was proved that the economic benefit (in financial terms) for I/A in the pharmaceutical industry could be many times greater than the cost (price) term. In order to help industry with the often higher than expected up-front costs, Protea using its own group's monetary muscle, can offer very attractive financial packages that when combined with the many benefits of I/A (improved productivity, lower manufacturing costs, lower maintenance costs etc) can show real cash- flow benefits to even the most obdurate accountant.
Towards the future
The focus of the revitalised Protea Automation Solutions will be to provide automation and control solutions to industry which embody the latest in technology, and which add significant value through lower cost of ownership. In order to achieve this goal, the local company will continue to represent leading international suppliers and will support these products locally through its skilled human resource base. As Protea intends to provide integration from the sensor level right through to the MIS, it can truly be said to be offering solutions from sensor right through to the boardroom.
Protea Automation Solutions
(011) 719 5700
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