MANAGERS & EXECUTIVES SKILLS

Reduce Capital Budgets Through Focused Planning

“The general rule-of-thumb I'm seeing is this: ‘Capital spending is bad,’ ” says Neil Cooper, general manager of manufacturing and business operations for controls vendor Invensys Process Systems (www.ips.invensys.com), Plano, Texas. He sees this especially in refining, where “they don't want to be spending cash on existing facilities.”

But capital improvements are inevitable—and getting approval to spend capital almost always requires a project to be competitively attractive. That means showing the real return the future asset provides within a pre-determined period, typically with the return-on-investment (ROI) metric using the net present value (NPV) of the total outlay. For some budgets, that may mean looking more at an asset's lifecycle costs.

Demonstrating the winning ROI first means researching investments and doing the right no-surprises planning. For automation systems, “look at the initial cost of the system, from design to intellectual property, and at the things that don't need to be touched again,” states Gayle Hicks, Invensys Process director of advantage & lifecycle management, in Foxboro, Mass.

Further, get reliable information from the supplier about the product's future road map. With that data, end-users might be able to avoid the capital budgeting process entirely by upgrading capital equipment via a service contract. For example, Hicks notes, unless there's a complete change in technology, “maybe only 5 percent to 10 percent of the system will need to be replaced.”... Read more

» IT & NETWORKING SKILLS: Software Services Integrate Applications -
Some may think the idea of manufacturing information flowing “from sensor to boardroom” may just be an unachievable dream. After all, the reality of manufacturing information is that there are a multitude of different applications that each store information in different ways and communicate using differing protocols and methods.

There is a technology, however, that is gaining ground in manufacturing software circles that promises better integration of all of these applications—Service Oriented Architecture (SOA)... Read more

» OPERATIONS & ENGINEERING SKILLS: Bit-level Buses Compete on Speed, Connectivity -
Down in the lower levels of the seven-layer International Organization for Standardization's (www.iso.ch) Open System Interconnection Reference Model, two bit-level buses compete to control devices such as actuators and sensors: the Actuator Sensor Interface (AS-I) and CompoNet.

While the AS-International Association's (www.as-interface.net) AS-I appeared about 15 years ago, CompoNet, from the Open DeviceNet Vendors Association (ODVA, www.odva.org), arrived in October 2006. Both offer high-speed communication. Both also offer some level of safety features and/or connectivity... Read more

ANNOUNCEMENT

Automation Professionals -- Don't miss a unique educational and networking opportunity!

Automation World is partnering with Packaging World to sponsor a Forum emphasizing automation strategies, controls, standards and integration with enterprise systems. The event, also known as Packaging Automation Forum, is Tuesday May 20 at the Chicago Marriott Schaumburg (O'Hare area).