The food and beverage (F&B) industry has been a major end-user of electric drives in Europe.  The economic slowdown had however an adverse impact on most industries, including the F&B one, impacting on the demand for electric drives. Current dynamics have heightened the need for energy-efficient, highly reliable and appropriate product customization.Electric drives represent almost 2/3 of the energy consumption demand in the F&B industry. Surging energy prices have however had a negative impact on the performance of this industry. In this context, energy-efficient drives have helped companies reduce production costs, improve ROI and lower CO2 emissions.“The F&B industry is…

The market for industrial networking is still strong according to a new report from IMS Research, an independent provider of market research and consultancy. An estimated 31 million new fieldbus and Ethernet nodes were installed worldwide in 2011; this number is forecast to grow by an average of 10% a year, to just over 45 million new connected nodes in 2015. The report, “The World Market for Industrial Networking – 2011 Edition”, forecasts that, in EMEA and the Americas, new connected nodes will grow fastest in servo and inverter drives. Their grow rate will be 11.8% a year, resulting in…

Growth in the Brazilian medium voltage drives market will outpace that of the Chinese market by 2% over the next three years, with revenue growth forecast at 18.5% annually in Brazil from 2011 to 2014, according to two new studies by IMS Research. The two markets are vastly different in size, as the Chinese market represents 28% of the global consumption of drives compared with Brazil’s 3% share. High growth in Brazil is predominately driven by oil & gas and mining expansion, as well as projects for infrastructure improvement. Brazil’s state-run energy company’s plan to achieve daily production of 500,000…

This month, DrivesMag asked North American process chemical plant designers and facility managers about their facilities and process lines. The answers to the question: What communication method do you use in your plants/processes? return some interesting insights into automation and control networks and the systems that define their work. Users were able to choose more than one answer and were given the choice of "other", but rarely selected it. This research has a confidence factor of 90% and a confidence interval of 10%.

Despite the outlook for the Photo Voltaic (PV) manufacturing equipment market remaining bleak in 2012, a new report from IMS Research claims that there could be a 20GW opportunity for the upgrade or replacement of existing capacity over the next 4 years. Revenue declines of over 65% are forecast for the PV manufacturing equipment market in 2012. However, there may be a bright spot: aging equipment requiring upgrade or complete replacement is where the majority of equipment revenues will come from in 2012. The research report found that this could provide a 20 GW opportunity for equipment suppliers, generating some…

Process Engineers have a wide choice of technologies and products at their disposal for custody transfer flow measurement, a transaction involving transporting physical substance from one operator. Newer flowmeter technologies such as coriolis and ultrasonic offer increased reliability, reduced pressure drop, and high accuracy. At the same time, flowmeter suppliers are making improvements in the performance of meters using more established technologies. Turbine flowmeters, for example, are being made with stronger bearings, offering longer life. Paul Everett at IMS Research comments, “differential pressure (DP) flowmeters appear to be holding their own. DP flowmeters still have the largest installed base of any…

Drives are coupled with motor systems for one of two basic reasons: 1.) affinity laws promise greater energy efficiency when full speed operation isn’t required, or 2.) something about the process demands variable operation and control. Sometimes the needs are combined and the drive, or drives, become very important elements in a machine, building, water or factory system. This article will focus on energy efficiency. Since the drive came into view as a green technology -- a tool to lower consumption and costs associated with energy -- the economics of drives have improved. For example, since 2001, the base costs of…

Until 2009, Asia Pacific was still the smallest regional DCS (Distributed Control Systems) market, but it has grown quickly in the last few years, particularly in China and India. Although DCS revenues in EMEA and the Americas fell in the 2009 recession, the market in Asia Pacific still managed to continue to grow, despite a decline in Japan.  In this market, much of the revenues from Asia can be attributed to DCS hardware bought for greenfield projects, such as for addressing the energy and infrastructure needs of a growing population with more disposable income, and of continued urbanization in India…

Highlights from their answers: "Drives are a must have in all HVAC projects. The real issue is that customers become familiar with one brand or product." "HVAC systems all have them. The issue is who, not what." "The market seems to believe in them now. When we're convinced of short payback we don't resist." "We know we need them. We listen to the market for brand preference." Data to follow in subsequent posts.  

If you are in the Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) business, the recovery from the downturn happened much earlier than had been generally expected. Most PLC suppliers were pessimistic on their future business after the economic crisis of 2009 and thought their business would not recover to the level of 2008 until 2013. However, in the event, their business was back on track three years earlier than they had expected; in some countries in developing regions, such as China and India, revenues had grown even in 2009. Overall global revenues from PLCs in 2010 were nearly 30% higher than in 2009,…