Paul Studebaker is chief editor of Control. He earned a master's degree in metallurgical engineering and gathered 12 years experience in manufacturing before becoming an award-winning writer and editor for publications including Control and Plant Services.In many places and many ways over the course of Schneider Electric's 2015 Global Automation Conference this week in Dallas, the company revealed its near- and long-term plans to develop and integrate its product lines. From the process control point of view, the plans center on the role of the Foxboro Evo process automation system.
Introduced 18 months ago in September, 2013, "Foxboro Evo today is in more than 200 sites in more than 60 countries, in all aspects of major industries," said Grant Le Sueur, senior portfolio director, control and safety, Schneider Electric, to a packed session on the Foxboro Evo roadmap and vision. "Our beta testing is done with real data in real sites—we test it with you and exercise the new features in the real world before we release it."
The Foxboro Evo user audience has expanded into other disciplines. "To protect security and safety, we've enhanced the Tricon safety controller and made it so when you create a point in it, it's automatically revealed in the control system," said Le Sueur.
For engineering, the use of SAMA instrumentation representations eliminate the busy work and enable value-based creative aspects. "So does our acquisition of LimeWare and its foxray application, which is so exciting," Le Sueur said. "But if you have it, you already know."
For operations, Foxboro Evo Control HMI helps make operators more productive and effective. Operational insight gives them the right information to make the right decisions.
Steering Committees seek your input
"All this great content wouldn't be possible without the Foxboro Steering Committee—the 12 people in gray shirts want your comments and input for next year's conference," said Rod Wetsch, E&I supervisor, Dakota Gasification Co. and chairman of the committee, at the Schneider Electric 2015 Global Automation Conference in Dallas.
"We're now forming a Modicon steering committee, so if you use Modicon in your plant, consider joining," Wetsch said. "Network with your peers, understand applications and help plan the roadmap."
The Foxboro Steering Committee is looking to round out its industry expertise with representatives from pulp & paper, mining, pharma and water/wastewater. Wetsch said, "It's not a hard job, just a conference call once a month, and it's worth the time."
"Today, maintenance personnel must encounter and deal with a wide variety of technology," Le Sueur said. "They need a wheelbarrow full of handheld configurators. We're working with Field Device Manager and Maintenance Response Center applications to reduce that load.
"For management, we work to minimize obsolescence and increase value, so they can make products more profitably. Operational integrity lets operations continue to run by keeping systems always available, and future-proofing means we don't come to you with upgrades that require you to buy new hardware and software."
The roadmap includes a plan for the next 12 to 18 months, with an eye to 10 years and beyond.
More distributed power and connectivity
A new M580 high-end ePAC offers new levels of performance and redundancy. These and other Schneider Electric devices will be integrated with Foxboro Evo. Additionally, the M580 range will extend into SIL 3-rated PLC applications in 2016.
"I don't want to enter data twice to integrate a device into the system," said Alain Ginguene, director of offer management, Foxboro Evo, Schneider Electric. Near-term developments include low- and medium-voltage (LVMV) drives, M580 PAC and other device integration via tested, validated documented architecture (TVDA) applications that offer proven, pre-engineered templates for an ever increasing number of common industry and integration challenges. Using them, "Drives and PLCs are integrated into Evo, including in the HMI," Ginguene said.
