Articles and News

REACH is a European Community safety and environmental regulation that deals with the registration, evaluation, authorization and restriction of chemical substances.

By Bill Lydon, Editor Pharmaceutical automation leaders from around the world gathered to discuss a number of automation challenges, including how their companies are dealing with reduced personnel and the need to support multiple technologies at multiple sites. This article highlights those conversations and addresses the automation support models and the use of managed services.

More than 70 automation and control professionals gathered in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, USA at the inaugural ISA Food and Pharmaceuticals Industries Division (FPID) Symposium.

Classes typically are a combination of classroom and hands-on training covering various aspects of process safety, including P&ID drawings, hazard and operability (HAZOP) studies, Safety Integrity Level (SIL), Safety Instrumented Systems (SIS), Layer of Protection Analysis (LOPA), and similar topics.

The free workshop teaches the essential elements of Safety Instrumented Systems including how to comply with myriad safety requirements. The workshop is available in a two-day classroom in Calgary, or as a three-day webinar.

Werum is a provider of software for production control and production monitoring for the pharmaceutical and biopharmaceutical industry.

The 2014 ISA FPID Symposium will be held 5-6 March 2014 at ISA headquarters in Research Triangle Park, North Carolina, USA.

Endress+Hauser Group increased its net sales by approximately 7 percent to over 1.8 billion euros ($2.43 billion) in the 2013 financial year.

Through the donations of Endress+Hauser, Rockwell Automation and TriNova, Polk State College will be the new home to a $1 million, state-of-the-art PTU (Process Training Unit).

By Bill Lydon, Editor With this acquisition, Schneider Electric significantly enhanced its position to serve the process industries and now has a complete portfolio of products to serve the entire industrial and process automation industry. This article highlights a few key aspects of the integration of the two companies.

By Bill Lydon, Editor The huge installed base of automation software running on Windows XP will be vulnerable to cyber-attacks with the end of Windows XP support April 8, 2014. More than 12 years old, Windows XP is the longest supported version of Windows ever and therefore is the most used in industrial automation systems.

By Bill Lydon, Editor I recently had the opportunity to discuss Ocean Data Systems – a little company you likely have never heard of - with Roy Kok, their VP of Sales and Marketing. Their product, Dream Report, is OEMed by a number of well-known software providers. Here is a synopsis of my interview with Kok.

ACM Facility Safety provides SafeGuard Sentinel SIL safety software that systems integrator Autopro Automation Consultants will help implement in process industries.

By Robert Golightly, AspenTech Adaptive Process Control provides a set of innovative, patented techniques for automatic adjustment of the controllers in real-time and elevates maintenance to a built-in and continuous part of the management process.

By Bill Lydon, Editor Foxboro has dramatically stepped up the power of their controller with the Foxboro Evo process automation system introduction. This controller is a great example of the new breed of controllers that leverages the latest technology.

By Paul Hodge & Joe Bastone, Honeywell The advantages of optimized project workflow can be realized at both ends of the project schedule. The benefits are essential to ensuring control systems pose the least risk to project schedule and allow for safe, efficient and reliable plant startup and operation.

Dr. Reddy's successfully rolled out Werum's PAS-X Manufacturing IT Business Platform at their Indian greenfield site in Visakhapatnam, India.

Scientists at Reading Scientific Services are using a Morphologi G3 automated particle imaging system to troubleshoot particle sizing methods for pharmaceutical clients and develop fully validated procedures.

By Bill Lydon, Editor As government agencies and the pharmaceutical & life sciences industry take measures to reduce drug counterfeiting, product diversion, and increase patient safety, drug manufacturers are faced with the challenge of implementing serialization and tracking systems.

By Bill Lydon, Editor The ability to improve manufacturing operations is growing with the application of software that can leverage lower cost computing. More than 30 years ago, ULTRAMAX Corporation commercialized an interesting software product to optimize the operating performance of industrial processes. I recently caught up with the Founder and CEO to learn more about the product and their philosophy and perspective of industrial process optimization.