Managing Automation - February 2009 - (Page 13) generic, horizontal field service applications rather than technology platforms on which manufacturers and resellers can create field service solutions that address problems faced by specific manufacturing verticals. And, finally, Canosa says, most current M2M applications don’t provide equipment-monitoring data in real time, requiring such data to be downloaded to a server before it can be analyzed. Canosa’s new M2M company, Palantiri, aims to get around those shortcomings by using the Extensible Messaging and Presence Protocol (XMPP) to communicate with field devices. XMPP, the same protocol used to enable instant messaging over the Internet, essentially allows field devices and service technicians to communicate online in real time. Despite the disappointing M2M market growth, vendors remain hopeful. Axeda, for example, grew revenue in 2008 and sees continued strong customer interest, particularly among manufacturers of complex medical equipment, Anderson says. And the company’s shift last year to a software-as-a-service model will help lower up-front M2M deployment costs and improve returns on M2M investments, he says. Anderson declined to say whether Axeda is profitable. In an attempt to further spur the market, Axeda is also in discussions to involve systems integrators more actively in the market, Anderson says. At the same time, Canosa says, venture capital investment firms remain interested in the M2M market. “There is still significant interest in the space,” he says. “Investors are looking for companies that can actually come up with something that will make the market fulfill its potential.” TECH ISN’T AIDING CORPORATE GOALS, MCKINSEY FINDS T oday’s business leaders feel that their IT departments are poorly aligned with the strategic direction of their businesses, a recent McKinsey & Co. report found. In its third annual survey on IT strategy and spending, McKinsey asked a mix of more than 500 technology and non-technology leaders across the United States what they thought of IT’s role within their organizations. When the firm’s analysts asked participants whether their IT department’s efforts were integrated with the strategies of the business, only 22% said they were tightly integrated and exerted influence over one another. A full 67% thought they should be. In the typical scenario, 42% of respondents said, management develops a business strategy, which it then uses to craft IT’s roadmap. Only 16% considered this an ideal practice. As for the day-to-day efforts of their IT workers, 83% of non-technology leaders graded their technology departments extremely effective or somewhat effective in cost-effectively delivering basic services, such as e-mail and computer maintenance. Those same respondents ranked IT least effective in “proactively engaging with business leaders on new ideas and enhancements to existing processes and systems.” Asked to describe the ideal IT environment, respondents imagined that it would “promote innovation and better enable companies to seize new opportunities,” according to the survey. “Still, [respondents] continue to see a gulf between these aspirations and the value that IT currently delivers,” the report stated. Cost cutting in IT emerged as one of the least-welcome business practices. Forty-two percent of respondents listed cost cutting as a current driver, but only 19% said it represented an ideal scenario. Similarly, participants thought IT resources were being inordinately spent on compliance efforts. More than onethird of business leaders said ensuring regulatory compliance was a current priority, but only 14% rated it an ideal pursuit. On the flip side, IT constituents appear to be spending less time creating new IT products and services than leaders would like. Nearly half of the survey takers considered such activity an ideal use of IT resources, but only 27% said it was a priority for the next business cycle. In McKinsey’s sample pool, both IT and nonIT executives were in lockstep in prescribing an improvement in the business’ accountability for IT-related projects. More IT constituents than non-IT constituents advocated improving the capabilities of the IT staff and reallocating IT budgets to focus on critical business value drivers. Not surprisingly, more non-technology leaders (22%) than technology leaders (18%) saw a remedy in outsourcing some or all of the problem areas to external providers. And while the survey shows that alignment of business and IT goals remains hard to come by, McKinsey noted improvement, with 56% of leaders saying their IT strategies include technology-driven business innovations; only 42% said so last year. — Chris Chiappinelli Scan T Back inMA MA FEBRUARY 2008 hough many manufacturers had created lean, repeatable processes within the production environment, few had yet tried to tackle the processes that feed the plant with materials, orders, new products, and critical information. The challenges of applying lean to nonproduction processes, such as supply chain planning and sales and marketing, would require a major cultural shift and far deeper manufacturer-supplier collaboration than ever before. MA FEBRUARY 2004 RP vendors were eyeing the MES market as a growth opportunity, but their lack of experience with plant operations was driving them into partnerships with MES vendors, or in some cases, outright acquisitions. Meanwhile, the MES pureplays were guarding their turf, presenting their expertise as a differentiating factor. Also, members of the Manufacturing Enterprise Solutions Association (MESA) elected Kevin Roach, vice president of GE Fanuc Automation, its new chairman. E M A F E B R UA RY 19 9 9 indows CE had already become established in manufacturing environments as the operating system powering handheld PCs, automating product data collection and audits. The next phase of CE’s influence would be fueled by automation vendors’ anticipated release of hardware and software products that would use CE to achieve better data integration, improved maintenance, and reduced downtime. MA took a close look at the Windows CE landscape. W M A F E B R UA RY 19 9 4 M A paid tribute to the late W. Edwards Deming, an authority on statistical quality control, who had recently died at age 93. A mathematician by training, Deming taught a generation of Japanese, and then American, businesspeople what it means to manufacture with quality, respect for human beings, and a vision for the future. MA explored his teachings and influence on American manufacturing. 13 February 2009
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