Schneider Electric to acquire InStep Software

Schneider Electric, the global specialist in energy management, has entered into an agreement to acquire InStep Software, of Chicago, Illinois, a leading provider of real-time performance management and predictive asset analytics software and solutions. It is the latest acquisition from the company’s growing Software business and deepens its presence in the power and energy market. The transaction is expected to close in the fourth quarter of 2014, subject to customary regulatory and other closing conditions. Financial details were not disclosed.

Headquartered in Chicago, and founded in 1995, InStep provides two primary real-time performance management and predictive analytics software solutions: eDNA historian software collects, stores, analyzes, displays and reports on real-time operational and machinery sensor data: Prism predictive analytics software monitors the real-time health and performance of critical assets by using advanced pattern recognition and diagnostic techniques to identify subtle deviations in operating behavior that are often the early warning signs of imminent failures. The company also offers the EBS energy management software, which helps universities reduce their utility costs by analyzing energy consumption and streamlining the utility billing, cost allocation and reporting processes.

“Acquiring InStep Software is indicative of our commitment to delivering game-changing technology and powerful new solutions that improve efficiency, manage risk and drive higher levels of customer value,” said Ravi Gopinath, evp of the Schneider Electric Global Solutions software business. “They have a proven, experienced team who are dedicated to helping their customers achieve new levels of value, performance and profitability, and we are delighted to welcome them to Schneider Electric.”

eDNA software strongly complements the Schneider Electric Wonderware Historian software, and Prism software enhances their industry-leading information and asset management software offerings. Many of the world’s most successful companies use InStep software products to manage and analyze the rapidly growing amount of real-time operational and machinery asset-health-related information, but its solutions also complement the Schneider Electric offerings in several other industries, including food & beverage, consumer packaged goods, metals & mining, life sciences and water & wastewater.

“As with other recent acquisitions, InStep Software strengthens our portfolio in targeted industries and segments,” said Rob McGreevy, vice president, information, operations and asset management, Schneider Electric. “Their solutions give us additional, stronger data management and predictive analytics capabilities in the power and energy management industries, including power transmission and distribution, and will help us fulfill our strategic plans around Big Data, the Internet of Things and other emerging trends. With InStep, we strengthen our reputation as an industry game changer, and we are immediately more competitive in traditional process manufacturing, which fits with our overall strategy of improving our access to the utilities market in North America.”

“The emerging technologies for Big Data, analytics, the Internet of Things, machine-to-machine and workforce mobility enable new means for improving process quality and equipment reliability while also reducing maintenance costs,” said Ralph Rio, research director at ARC Advisory Group. “InStep’s capabilities for predictive analytics leverage these technology trends and provide clear business value.  When combined with the strengths of Schneider Electric, we expect wider adoption in the power industry, and acceptance in a broader set of other industries where asset reliability and cost control are important.”

“Combined with Schneider Electric’s existing software offerings, our capabilities and expertise in the power and energy segment allow us to provide broader end-to-end visualization, asset management, operations and mobile solutions to our customers,” said John Kalanik, president of InStep Software. “Together, our software products will make it easier to bridge the IT-OT gap, empowering our customers to manage the increasing volume and complexity of their industrial operations. Our customers will continue to work with the same experienced InStep Software team, and we will continue to provide the same exceptional products and services they have come to expect and rely on. With Schneider Electric, our customers will be backed by a leading-edge global software company and our employees will have more opportunities to fulfill their potential for success.”

InStep Software will continue to be managed by its existing executive team, adding approximately 70 employees to the Schneider Electric operations in the United States.

Gary Mintchell, from the Schneider Electric bash (their Software Golbal Conference) in the US (Orlando), today additionally added to this release the following comments in his themanufacturingconnection.com blog:

“Schneider recently had announced a new extension to the SimSci product line. Now we have an acquisition. I take this to mean that Schneider has seriously decided to become a software company. I’ve never thought of the company as having a commitment to software.

Gopinath just used a word I used some time ago. Stability. These manufacturing software companies (Wonderware, SimSci, Avantis plus Foxboro, Triconex, etc.) under the instability of Invensys were threatened. Perhaps the stability of Schneider Electric will help these grow and prosper.”

– an interesting observation!

IHS analysis of Siemens purchase of Dresser-Rand

GE Oil & Gas acquired Cameron’s reciprocating compressors division in January to kick off the new year. This, coupled with the recent GE purchase of Alstom’s Power and Grid business, solidified its position as a leading player in the oil and gas sector. IHS estimates that GE turbines and compressors sold into oil and gas applications account for just less than 35% of global capacity, which is roughly 10-15% more than Siemens, including its newly acquired Rolls Royce product line-up. With the recent Siemens announcement that it will purchase leading gas compressor and turbine supplier Dresser-Rand Group Inc, the company is well-poised to stake its claim as a heavyweight rival to GE.

This acquisition is not a surprise, though the timing is rather unexpected. Just last week it appeared as though Dresser-Rand was entertaining the possibility of a merger with another company that is well positioned in the oil and gas sector, the Swiss industrial pump manufacturer Sulzer. Talks of a potential merger between Sulzer and Dresser-Rand seem to have contributed to a recent spike in DRC’s stock price, requiring a larger investment by Siemens to win the bid for the compressor and turbine provider. In fact, the acquisition cost Siemens $83 per DRC share, a premium of roughly 37% to the share price back in July before acquisition talks were public knowledge. Siemens appears to be quite confident in its newest investment despite the premium. “The valuation is a stretch, but strategically it makes sense,” said Volker Stoll, a Stuttgart-based analyst at Landesbank Baden-Wuerttemberg.

European oil and gas equipment providers like Siemens, Sulzer, Howden and others have long desired to expand into North America to take advantage of the highly attractive conventional and unconventional energy plays. DRC has been a major player in this sector as its foothold in North America is substantial. This acquisition is a strategic win for Siemens, both geographically and technically. Aside from greatly expanding its presence in the US, Siemens will gain a strong foothold in such lucrative areas as subsea compression, carbon capture and storage (CCS) and compressed air energy storage (CAES), in which DRC has been a pioneer.

The full impact of this acquisition remains to be seen, but one thing that is certain is that GE Oil & Gas now has a much more formidable rival in Siemens. The most successful oil and gas equipment providers are the ones that can offer custom full-scale solutions and exceptional after-sales support. DRC and Siemens have both been successful in these areas over the years, with aftermarket parts and service accounting for more than 50% of their respective revenues. With Siemens’ regional breadth and DRC’s technical capabilities, this acquisition has a lot of potential to elevate the Siemens market position.

ABB concentrates on safety

The last four years has seen a major investment by ABB, growing their network of Safety Execution Centers to number thirty, located within every region to support the major high hazard industrial sectors. These centers provide ABB customers with in-country dedicated and competent functional safety resources for safety instrumented system (SIS) project execution, design, engineering, modification and maintenance. ABB has more than 700 TÜV, CFSE-certified and ABB technology-certified safety engineers.

ABB claims to have more safety centers than any other supplier in the industry, providing individual third-party accreditation (by either TÜV Rheinland or TÜV SÜD) for each country for Functional Safety Management System (FSMS) delivery, implementation, operations and maintenance. With the strong local business presence provided by ABB, these TÜV-certified Safety Execution Centers provide local assurance and knowledge of local legislation and standards: local clients have a higher degree of confidence in local teams, with better site knowledge than remote ‘experts’, and prefer the local safety certification, in contrast to one overriding global competence certificate.

ABB’s strategy is held up by Heinz Gall representing the Certification Body of TÜV Rheinland for FSMS Certification: “We definitely support the approach of ABB having individual worldwide FSM Certification. We from TÜV Rheinland do not recommend a single ‘global’ FSM certificate for multisite-multi-country certification. Our safety philosophy requires an in-depth judgment of each single location in order to confirm correct understanding and application of expected safety requirements.”

From ABB, both John Walkington and Stuart Nunns say “ABB is committed to providing our customers with the resources, technology and tools they need to help them operate their plants more safely, as well as protect their employees, the environment and the surrounding community. The depth and scope of our regulatory, technical and project execution knowledge provides our customers with the trusted expertise they need to successfully protect the integrity of their process, plant and people.”

E-learning for IEC61508

The ABB Safety Lead Competence Centre, and Engineering Safety Consultants, have partnered to develop an e-learning technical training course on “Failure Mode & Effects Analysis in the context of IEC61508”. This addresses the need for an adequate level of competence to be able to achieve compliance with IEC 61508 and IEC 61511, when applying the many devices now available for use within safety instrumented systems. The course will meet industry needs to ensure engineers receive appropriate training and mentoring for the challenges in compliance with IEC 61508 requirements.

Emerson SIS burner management system for Sasol

Emerson Process Management has successfully completed a DeltaV SIS burner management system migration project for the Sasol integrated chemical plant in Sasolburg, South Africa.

Sasol is a global energy and chemical company that produces fuel, oil, gas, polymers, chemicals, and fertilisers. The company has a large market for waxes that are used for an array of applications including adhesives, construction boards, cosmetics, packaging, pharmaceuticals, polymer processing, rubber, and tyres.

A burner management system (BMS) is the last line of defence in preventing the catastrophic failure of boilers, fired heaters, and other industrial heating systems. In the wax work-up production process at the Sasol plant, the old burner management system for a distillation column furnace reached its end of life and had to be replaced. Running continuously with scheduled shutdowns occurring between two to five years apart, this furnace was very critical to the production and its failure would cause a production loss of up to $150k per day.

Sasol selected Emerson and its local business partner, Aveng Automation and Control Solutions (A&CS), to migrate the old system to the Emerson DeltaV SIS for Burner Management during the annual plant shutdown in 2014. The solution ensured that it would be integrated seamlessly into the plant DeltaV distributed control system, which Sasol adopted in 2012. Moreover, it fulfilled the Sasol objective, which was to be in full compliance with the South African National Standards (SANS) accreditation 329, which sets the safety standards for industrial thermo-processing equipment.

“Safety is a top priority and a core value at Sasol,” said Willie de Beer, Senior Control Technician from Sasol Wax. “Emerson demonstrated technology leadership and project expertise, and together with the excellent local support from Aveng, this ensured a smooth migration process that was completed quickly and ahead of schedule. Through their support, we were able to deploy an advanced system to protect our people and assets from burner hazards.”

The Emerson Burner Management application allows the furnace to go safely through all relevant states, from start-up, to operation and shutdown when needed. It comes with IEC 61508 TÜV certified function blocks that simplify logic configuration, testing, and troubleshooting. An intuitive, graphical control environment conveys critical information in a single glance so operators can understand furnace conditions in real-time, put burners and igniters in and out of service safely and fast, and initiate other timely actions to maintain safe operating conditions.

“We are very happy that we have been able to help Sasol achieve this state of the art burner management,” said Peter Zornio, chief strategic officer for Emerson. “This project demonstrates our DeltaV SIS system flexibility, which has been able to meet BMS needs, increase visibility to plant processes involving fired equipment, and reduce engineering and complexity in system planning, design, configuration, and testing.”

Sasol CEO to join ABB Board

ABB’s Board of Directors has unanimously proposed David Constable, ceo of Sasol, as a new member. The shareholders will vote on his nomination at the company’s next annual general meeting on April 30, 2015.

Constable is the President and CEO of Sasol Limited, a leading international integrated energy and chemicals company based in South Africa, and the former Group President of Operations of Fluor Corporation, where he served for more than 29 years in leadership positions. He is also a member of the WEF International Business Council and The Business Council in the United States. He is 52 and a Canadian national.

Since Constable’s appointment as President and CEO of Sasol, he has driven a comprehensive, group-wide change program, which has reset the organization’s strategies, priorities, culture, operating model, structures, systems and processes. Importantly, he has also shaped the group’s growth initiatives in southern Africa and North America, driving well-defined contracting strategies and world-class project execution.

“David Constable’s nomination to the board reflects ABB’s commitment to strengthen our expertise for EPC solutions and the process industries sector,” said Hubertus von Grünberg, Chairman of the Board. “His strong background and experience in a field where ABB recently faced challenges in the Power Systems division will further enrich our board. His strong link with Africa as an attractive region for ABB makes him a welcome new member of our board.”

Constable has extensive international experience. He has lived and worked in the United States, the Netherlands, Canada, Chile, Argentina and South Africa. He is married with two children.

Danfoss to acquire Vacon

Denmark’s Danfoss A/S has bid $1.34Bn for the acquisition of Finland’s Facon Oyj, which would result in the union of two of the ten largest variable frequency drive suppliers globally. According to Kevin Schiller of IHS, the combined low voltage drive revenue from the two companies represent over 10% of the global market value; this is slightly less than the estimated market shares for ABB and Siemens, the two largest suppliers of low voltage drives globally.

As the figure above indicates, both companies have strong market share in EMEA and Asia Pacific regions. The combination of the Vacon and Danfoss VFD businesses will compete heavily in these regions, where traditionally only ABB and Siemens have competed for top market share. Further, the Danfoss announcement lauds Vacon’s strengths in China, Finland, India, Italy, and the United States.

According to the Danfoss press release, the combination of the Vacon and Danfoss drive businesses is expected to create ‘a new AC drives business with the clear ambition to build a leading position in the AC drives market’. While VFD market analyst Kevin Schiller from IHS agrees that the acquisition will secure a stronger foothold for the Danfoss and Vacon drive products, the newly formed drives business resulting from the acquisition of Vacon by Danfoss will not resemble its competitors. “ABB and Siemens cultivate much of their drives business alongside their sizeable share of the integral AC motor market, and are able to offer complete system solutions across all power ranges. Conversely, Danfoss has a comparatively undersized standalone motor market share. However, with significant market share in drives integrated with motors and end equipment, the new Danfoss and Vacon integration will most likely affect the competitive landscape in lower power ranges – below 50 kW.”

Through the acquisition of Vacon, Danfoss hopes to become the leading supplier of drives within the Nordic region, which has an estimated market size of over $500m. This region is expected to grow slightly slower than the market average, at just over 7% CAGR, from 2013 to 2018. While Danfoss has traditionally concentrated on the HVAC industry, the addition of Vacon’s business will diversify sales channels and strengthen product portfolios in the power generation and building automation sectors.

The Danfoss release published on 12 September was as follows:

Danfoss announces a public tender offer for all shares of the Finnish AC drives company Vacon. Vacon shareholders are being offered a cash consideration of EUR 34 for each share in Vacon representing an aggregate equity purchase price of approximately EUR 1,038 million.

“After a careful examination of Danfoss’ offer, the Board of Directors of Vacon has unanimously decided to recommend that the shareholders accept it. Vacon is truly one of the great industrial success stories, even globally speaking. By joining forces, the two companies will create a Nordic-based global player – a new AC drives business with the clear ambition to build a leading position in the AC drives market,” says Panu Routila, Chairman of the Board at Vacon.

The background for Danfoss’ offer is the company’s strategic focus on creating profitable growth. Vacon is a good match to achieve this ambition. Today, both Danfoss Power Electronics and Vacon are significant players in the AC drives business, and together they will gain an even stronger market position.

“We have a clear strategic ambition to be one of the absolute top players in the businesses where we operate. Vacon is a very strong and innovative player and by creating this new drives business we can ensure a strong long-term growth trajectory,” says Niels B. Christiansen, CEO at Danfoss.

Vacon is a global company with exceptional R&D, production, and supply chain competences in China, Finland, India, Italy, and the United States, and a highly skilled sales and service organization in 31 countries. The company plays a crucial role in building a new AC drives business to challenge the top players in the world. Finland, as a hotspot in the global AC drives business, plays an especially crucial role and Danfoss will be positioning Finland as one of its future centers of excellence along with the other power electronics centers worldwide.

“I believe that customers will benefit significantly from the two companies joining forces as they will bring even more competitive, innovative, and attractive AC drives to the market. Today, Vacon is stronger than ever, and it has a great future ahead together with Danfoss,” says Vacon’s President and CEO, Vesa Laisi.
The offer is subject to e.g. approval by relevant authorities, such as competition authorities, and Danfoss gaining control of more than 90 percent of the Vacon shares.

A separate stock exchange release on Danfoss’ tender offer was published earlier today and can be found at http://www.vacon.com.

Yokogawa Dell PCs

Yokogawa Electric Corporation has signed a contract with Dell Inc for the global provision of PC models that are selected and customized for Yokogawa use. Under this contract, which was signed on August 20, Yokogawa will offer high-quality system solutions that utilize Dell PCs and Yokogawa industrial automation (IA) system-related products.

High performance PCs that incorporate the latest technologies are being used more and more in the control systems field, for example, by replacing the dedicated terminals used as human machine interfaces and to connect with host systems. However, while a production control system usually remains in use for a period of one to two decades or even longer, new PC hardware, operating systems, and application software incorporating the latest technologies and offering ever higher levels of performance are continually being released. While incorporating this new PC hardware and software in a control system, the control system supplier must take care to ensure that the overall system continues to meet the highest quality standards. To satisfy this need and offer quality system solutions, Yokogawa has concluded this contract with Dell for the supply of dedicated Yokogawa PC models.

Scope of the contract and the Yokogawa solution
Under the terms of the contract, Dell will supply PCs that have been tested to verify their compatibility with Yokogawa products. Yokogawa will globally distribute these PCs as Yokogawa certified models for use with its industrial automation system-related products, including the Centum VP integrated production control system, ProSafe-RS safety instrumented system, Plant Resource Manager (PRM), and Exa series solution-based software. These PCs are ‘long-life’ products that will remain available for twice as long as equivalent commercial off-the-shelf products. To meet a variety of operating conditions and installation requirements, they will be available in a rack-mount or desktop configuration with either a server or client operating system.

The provision of Dell PCs under the terms of this contract will enable Yokogawa to offer high quality system solutions. In addition, this will enable a reduction of maintenance costs. Key benefits are as follows:
1. Stable operation: As the PC hardware and OS to be used with the Yokogawa system-related products is set for a specified period of time, stable operation is ensured.
2. Fewer model changes: Because individual models are available for longer periods of time, model changes will be less of a concern when purchasing a new PC, either as an add-on or replacement.
3. One-stop maintenance service: Yokogawa‘s maintenance service will cover both its system-related products and the PCs.

Regarding this contract, Chiaki Itoh, vice president and head of the IA Marketing Headquarters, comments, “How to combine IT and IA is an important management issue for manufacturers because they urgently need to strengthen their competitiveness in the global market and ensure that they are managed in a sustainable fashion. By making the best use of Yokogawa IA technologies and know-how accumulated over the years and the latest Dell technologies and extensive supply chain, Yokogawa will continue to be able to offer its customers solutions that achieve the goals of our VigilantPlant initiative.”

“We are proud to partner with Yokogawa to help deliver next-generation industrial automation systems”, said Joyce Mullen, vice president and general manager OEM Solutions, Dell. “Yokogawa and Dell engineers are collaborating to deliver stable PC models tailored to the needs of control systems.”

ABB HVDC link to export renewable energy from N.Scotland

One of the latest ABB orders, worth over $800m, is from Scottish Hydro Electric (SHE) Transmission plc, to provide the Caithness-Moray high-voltage direct current (HVDC) power transmission link, which will connect the electricity grid on either side of the Moray Firth in northern Scotland. This follows a favorable decision by Ofgem (Office of Gas and Electricity Markets), an independent National Regulatory Authority, on the need for the link, which will bring green, renewable energy from wind, wave and tidal sources in the North to supply the larger populations residing further South.

ABB will design, engineer, supply and commission two 320 kilovolt land-based HVDC Light converter stations, one rated at 1,200 megawatts (MW) at Blackhillock in Moray and another rated at 800 MW situated at Spittal in Caithness.

ABB’s scope of supply also includes submarine and underground cables covering a total transmission length of nearly 160km. The link is scheduled to become operational in 2018.

“We are pleased to support this major transmission project that will enable integration of a significant amount of renewable energy into the grid and supply clean, emission-free electricity to millions of people,” said Claudio Facchin, head of the ABB Power Systems division. “ABB pioneered HVDC technology and continues to lead the way through innovation, as seen from several recent breakthroughs.”

SHE Transmission is undertaking a major strengthening of its power network serving the north of Scotland to accommodate the rapid growth in generation of electricity from renewable sources, with around 1,200 MW of wind, wave and tidal energy planned to be connected. With associated reinforcement of the existing onshore network, this project represents the largest investment in northern Scotland’s electricity network since the hydro development era of the 1950s.

A key enabler for this is the installation of a subsea HVDC cable, capable of carrying up to 1,200 MW of electricity between Caithness and Moray, equivalent to the electricity needs of about 2m Scottish residents.

ABB’s HVDC Light solution leads the way in VSC (Voltage Source Converter) technology. The company has delivered 13 of the 14 commissioned VSC links in the world. HVDC Light continues to be a preferred solution for long-distance underground and underwater power transmission links.

HVDC Light technology is increasingly being deployed across a range of applications such as the connection of remote renewables, cross-border interconnections, power-from-shore feeding offshore oil and gas platforms, and city center in-feeds where space is a constraint.

Sensors guide tractors accurately

Peterborough based Garford Farm Machinery designs and manufactures advanced environmentally sustainable agricultural equipment to help large scale weed control and crop cultivation farming problems worldwide. Its ‘Robocrop’ range, covering weeding, hoeing or spraying, employs a specially developed precision guided vision system that uses real-time digital image analysis in conjunction with a hydraulic servo ‘sideshift’ assembly that laterally positions various multiple tools  exactly on or within the crop rows as the tractor mounted equipment is driven forwards.

The precision guided tools are used for mechanical weed control; to remove individual unwanted plants, hoe between rows of plants, or spray rows of plants – with impressive lateral positional accuracies of better than 10 mm at average tractor speeds of 12 km/hr.

Variohm EuroSensor provides the durable precision linear and rotary sensors for use in these extreme environmental and physical conditions, for tractor steering angle and lateral position feedback for the plant rows. To complete the package of sensors on the Robocrop, Variohm also supplies combined pressure and temperature sensors for hydraulic system monitoring.

The In-Row Weeder

The Robocrop InRow Weeder is the latest in the Garford range and utilises the tried and tested video image analysis technique to locate crop plants through pixel and colour recognition and then use this information to control individual rotating weeding discs which actually hoe the area between the plants (inter-row) or in line with the plants (inter-plant), eradicating competing weeds but leaving crops intact. The InRow Weeder features multiple individual discs which operate across several crop rows with a maximum width of six metres. The rotation of each disc is synchronised with the forward speed of the tractor and the plant positional information from an imaging camera which can cover a two metre width. Each weeding disc is coupled to a hydraulic motor, driven via a proportional valve controlled by the cab mounted Robocrop computer, which includes an HMI display to select modes and display operational information.

The sensors supplied to Garford are part of a comprehensive range of sensor technologies that Variohm EuroSensor designs, manufactures or sources for linear and rotary position, load, force and vibration measurement in demanding applications throughout industry, agriculture, construction, autosports and research.