May 26, 2009 - ABB's Remote Service solution allows increased production uptime, reduced mean time between failure of robots and delivery of new services to customers. With Remote Service, the robot itself automatically alerts the on-call service engineer, who can immediately access detailed robot data and quickly identify the root cause of the fault. From that moment, ABB can offer support without being physically at a customer's side and drastically reduce the number of on-site travels.To achieve this, ABB Robotics selects eWON, the leading manufacturer of industrial M2M routers. “We were looking for off-the shelves solution to reach remotely ABB robots all around the world.
We select eWON for their profound experience and knowledge in Industrial Internet M2M Routers and wide products portfolio. With eWON, ABB is in an excellent position to boost our success and give us a powerful competitive edge”, said Dominique Blanc, Product Manager Remote Service, ABB Robots. eWON, a powerful and scalable solution The role of eWON centers around the concept of logging a robot’s key performance data and sending this remotely to an ABB service center via GPRS technology. The information can then be viewed, analysed and reported to customers. By monitoring robot condition, proactive actions can be decided to avoid potential failures that might happen in future.
“eWON offers a powerful JAVA platform that allowed us to develop our services. All communication aspects are managed by the eWON industrial router and it allows us to concentrate on our core business: the robot and advanced diagnostic methods”, said Blanc.
Keeping up with the evolution of communication technology
eWON is currently operational in 30 countries for ABB Robotic. eWON ensures perfect compatibility with GPRS networks worldwide. When GPRS network is not available, ABB Roboti cs connects the robots to the ABB service center using eWON brand new Internet service Talk2M. Talk2M allows secured communication between robots and the service centre over internet.
Fruitful Join collaboration
The successful deployment comes from a very tight collaboration between eWON and ABB team either in R&D, Quality and supply chain. ABB and eWON have settled a global frame agreement to reinforce the strategic collaboration between the two companies. “ABB offer us the unique experience to deploy our product over 35 countries in a single application, demonstrating our technology and improving our competence in large scale M2M project” said Serge Bassem, Chief Executive Officer of eWON.
Conclusion
eWON allows ABB Remote Service to improve availability, fewer service visits, lower maintenance costs and maximized total cost of ownership. This unique service sets ABB apart from its competitors to improve customer satisfaction and drastically reduce environment impact with less travels.
About ABB
ABB is a leading supplier of industrial robots - also providing robot software, peripheral equipment, modular manufacturing cells and service for tasks such as welding, handling, assembly, painting and finishing, picking, packing, palletizing and machine tending. Key markets include automotive, plastics, metal fabrication, foundry, electronics, pharmaceutical and food and beverage industries. A strong solutions focus helps manufacturers improve productivity, product quality and worker safety. ABB has installed more than 160,000 robots worldwide.
About eWON
eWON sa, part of the ACT’L group, is a Belgian electronic company manufacturing the eWON product line. Since its launch in 2001, eWON became a worldwide market challenger for intelligent Ethernet gateways and industrial IP routers. Thanks to its growing market recognition, the eWON concept and its service product range have become a reference and a quality standard for every major company in the industry.