Let me tell you about a great opportunity if you’re an executive or professional in the Manufacturing or Industrial sector. Cisco is hosting a special ‘Industrial Intelligence Day’ on the 12th July 2011 at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas held in conjunction with Cisco Live.
The event is especially tailored to bring together manufacturing, controls, operations and IT executives and professionals. The theme of the day is ‘Industrial Intelligence’, and will cover the subject of converging industrial automation systems based upon standard IP networks with business applications including voice and video to more responsively and cost-effectively manage industrial operations globally.
The day is packed with information, training, and industry best practices and is sure to be one of the smartest investments you can make in your career—and one of the smartest investments your employer can make in you.
By attending Cisco Industrial Intelligence at Cisco Live, you can:
Learn how Industrial Intelligence brings production closer to IT and converges industrial automation networks with business systems to improve the efficiency, safety, agility, and utilization of your production assets.
Receive training in architectures specific to industrial automation from Cisco and alliance partner Rockwell Automation including wireless and wired technology advancements, availability, security, sustainability and energy management.
Engage Industrial Intelligence and IT Networking thought leaders from our partners and the industrial analyst community via a live panel discussion plus join a community of manufacturing executives and IT and Control professionals deploying and operating Industrial applications and networks.
The resiliency and determination of America’s sense of justice was thrust into a spirit of rejoicing on Sunday evening May 1, 2011, when President Barack Obama addressed the world, confirming Osama bin Laden’s demise in Pakistan. While watching the breaking TV news coverage, I began to share that sense of accomplishment and joy, less for the act of neutralizing the thought leader and chief architect of 9/11 and other atrocities against Americans, and more for the fortitude and resolve demonstrated by the U.S. commander-in-chief, our military forces, and intelligence agencies. I found myself thinking of what this type of public resolve implies for the future state of our Manufacturing economy in the U.S., whose resurgence is essential to the country’s defenses, global leadership, and the health and prosperity of our citizens, along with those of other democratic nations.
Cisco’s Chet Namboodri, Global Director for Manufacturing Industry Solutions and Marketing, discusses the Smart Manufacturing Leadership Coalition (SMLC) proposals for Revitalizing American Manufacturing.
President Obama’s determination coming into office in January 2009 to recommit U.S. resources to bring justice to bin Laden, and the U.S. intelligence and military’s subsequent success bodes well as I consider his commitment to U.S. manufacturing competitiveness, infrastructure build-out and job creation articulated during the President’s January 2011 State of the Union address. During the last several quarters, I have had the privilege to present on behalf of Cisco to the Office of the President as part of the Smart Manufacturing Leadership Coalition (SMLC), a broad cross section of manufacturers, technology suppliers, manufacturing consortia, government laboratories and research universities across industry segments pulling together to recommend programs to revitalize U.S. manufacturing.
Wow -- I’m impressed. We have the best folks in Cisco. I’m sure of it. The best in the industry. And I don’t just mean me (he jests)!
No, really, Cisco’s innovation is ‘on fire’ as John Chambers puts it. I’m not just saying that because I work at Cisco. I’m saying it because I meet up with folks every day at Cisco who simply impress me with their down-and-out inventiveness. It might be products, processes or business architectures. Whatever it is, I’m often left thinking we have to tell our customers about that.
Innovators -- here are just a couple I found at Cisco - more where they came from! Actually Neil Dieder, Tech Leader, and Walt Shaw, Sr. Prod. Line Mgr, both from WNBU, the Cisco Wireless Networking Business Unit.
I speak to many customers at Executive Briefings (EBCs) and they echo my sentiment. When I talk about what we’re doing in the manufacturing industry, many of them say ‘Wow, I didn’t know Cisco did that!’ Well, I guess that’s the purpose of the EBC. Bring the customer to Cisco to tell them stuff they don’t know. Add that to what they do know and, well, they’re going to make a more informed decision.
It’s hard to choose one innovation since there are so many, but since my blogs are about manufacturing, I decided to talk about something that, on the surface is not all that exciting. Wireless Networking. Been around for years right? Right. Easy-peasy, right? Wrong! Read More »
From joint reference architectures to education webcasts, the collaboration between Cisco and Rockwell Automation benefits manufacturers. The partnership has empowered corporations globally and now industry experts from both companies are ready to share their best practices and lessons learned.
Thursday, April 28
9:00 a.m. PST / 10:00 a.m. MST / 11:00 a.m. CST / 12:00 p.m. EST
Growing demands for greater information access accelerate the convergence of manufacturing and enterprise networks and help manufacturers make better business decisions. As critical control systems link to company-wide infrastructures and beyond, new risks emerge that can affect productivity, operational efficiency and functional safety. To ensure the benefits derived from plantwide convergence outweigh risks and threats, it is imperative to follow contemporary architecture design practices that can enhance network resiliency and help protect key assets and information.
Learn From Industry Experts
Speakers Scott Johnston, Principal Consultant for Network & Security Services, Rockwell Automation and Bryce Barnes, Enterprise Vertical Solutions Architect for Manufacturing, Cisco, will discuss the solutions from Rockwell Automation and Cisco to address the challenges of network convergence. Learn the fundamentals and best practices for:
Securing manufacturing computing and controller assets
The value a Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) brings to your manufacturing framework
How FactoryTalk Services and Applications such as FactoryTalk ViewPoint and FactoryTalk
Transaction Manager can be deployed within the manufacturing framework to leverage the DMZ
Coke fork-lift truck drivers Use these Cisco phones with headsets to pick products more accurately and drive more safely.
For years Coke used a manual pick system Then they moved to a semi-automated one that could deal with full pallets, but then, with more and more products being added, Coca-Cola Refreshments U.S.A (CCR) found that it needed a better system to handle mixed pallets and make less shipment errors. Enter Cisco and Datria.
As their order profile changed CCR could no longer rely on a manual system to deal with mixed cases (80% of the order volume is now mixed pallets). CCR needed to have order accuracy rates of over 99.5% to get preferential supplier treatment from customers like Walmart. The Voice picking solution gives CCR 99.8% overall accuracy and 100% in some locations. And there’s more… Read More »
So here we are, at the end of March Madness. I saw a news story today that said out of 500,000 people that picked a bracket only 2 picked the existing Final Four.
I heard other statistics about how many times the top 1 and 2 seeds didn’t make it to the Final Four. This was a very unique season.
So, OK. This week baseball season opens. And by the way, the Brewers will rock the league.
We know you are reading our blogs. Some of you comment on them. Some of you comment privately to others. Some of you probably read them and think whatever your thoughts are.
Here is your opportunity:
Peter and Chet and Paul and Kevin and I will continue to write blogs about whatever “we” think is the relevant topic of the week.
But, we would far rather write about what you think is important. Let us know that. What do you want us to do with this blog, and what do you want us to talk about?
By the way -- my Final Four choices got broken pretty early. And it was a pretty great season, yes? I picked the top 1 seeds from each group, so hey, I was wrong. But I had good rationale for my choices. As does the rest of our Cisco manufacturing team. Try us, ask away, engage us. You won’t be sorry.
So here we are, in the middle of March Madness. Lots of people that don’t normally follow college basketball, but still a great social environment and an opportunity to get together and pretend we know the teams we all picked in our brackets. Sometimes we pick based on “loyalty” and other times there are other reasons. We all have various “borders” we deal with every day.
So, bring onBorderless Networks. In the manufacturing area we still tend to think of a “border” between the factory and the business. After all, how can those people in the front office know what we need in the factory, right? Well, that separation gets smaller and smaller every day. Why? Because we’ve blurred the border. Sure, there are appropriate firewalls and security between the various layers. But every day we run into people that tell about needing data from the plant, from the machine, from the supplier, from the sales force, from the channel, from the customer. And sometimes we’re not in the office, we may be at home, at a different supplier, in an airport, at a concert or ball game with our kids.
The point becomes, there is data there and I am not there but I need to make a call and affect my plant productivity or answer a question from my CEO because there is a big opportunity or a major customer disappointment about to happen.
This meter represents your reputation at a 100% scale based on your level of participation on the site. Find out more
Comments Off
My distant relative - Flight Lieutenant KJP Granger (Royal Air Force) and his DH82A Gipsy Moth - did the forerunner of RFID save him from being shot down?
Some of the best technological advances are made during times of conflict. Sad that it should be so, but the silver lining is that many of the advances are focused on defending, protecting and shielding people. Active RFID, the kind of solution provided by Cisco and AeroScout, in many ways started out that way.
Looking back decades to WWII, radar was already being developed in ernest by the British in the run-up to the second world war. Many countries were developing radar at that time, but most folks agree that Robert Watson Watt, later Sir Robert, was the prime mover-and-shaker. It took US marketing (in the form of the US Navy) to coin the term RADAR, for radio detection and ranging.
So where does Context Aware Location RFID come in? Well, whilst radar itself was useful, the British needed to know whether those planes coming over the English Channel were returning Spitfires and allied bombers, or attacking Luftwaffe aircraft. It was the same Watson-Watt that helped produce the ‘Identification friend or foe’ (IFF) system that used a transponder on the allied aircraft that was ‘excited’ by the radar system and actively sent back a signal to the base saying friend. My own cousin, Flight Lieutenant KJP Granger, Officer Trainer RAF, was grateful for that!
Now fast forward decades to today. The technology for today’s RFID is a little different, but the concept is the same. So let’s keep the aeronautical theme going and talk about Boeing and its use of RFID.Read More »
Last week at the ODVA Annual Conference--as part of ODVA’s announcement of a new energy initiative and white paper--Cisco’s Bryce Barnes roused a packed-house audience representing ODVA’s ~200 industrial and automation suppliers with a compelling speech on the immediate need for Optimization of Energy Usage (OEU™) in the Production domain. Energy consumption statistics for the industrial sector are staggering, most estimates suggesting half of the world’s total delivered energy, and that amount is projected to increase by 40% over the next 25 years. For Manufacturers, energy typically constitutes the first or second highest portion of product variable costs, and most manufacturing companies now report as part of their governance a sustainability strategy that is core to their overall business strategy. Furthermore, volatility of energy markets--closely linked to the stability of governments, international relations and policies--raises the risk profile for continuity of supply, production and satisfaction of customers. Optimizing energy consumption, minimizing energy costs and mitigating energy risks are clearly top of mind business imperatives for the Manufacturing CEO.
Mark Wylie discusses the importance of energy optimization to sustainable manufacturing operations. Check out Mark’s December blog on factory energy management.
This year for Christmas my wife gave me the wonderful gift of membership to our local gym, and in addition, a discounted gift pack of 8 personal trainer sessions. My first reaction was to be offended by the gesture until I gazed at the sincerity on her face and the “keg” below my chest. So, instead of wallowing in self pity. I proceeded to pull out and dust off my 1998 Brooks track shoes, my knee high athletic socks and my 2000 Los Angeles Laker’s Championship head band, and proceeded to walk out the door on my quest for a new and improved six pack.
How does this story relate to manufacturing? Well let me explain.
I did not make it out the door before my teenage daughter glanced at me, chuckled and stated, “Dad. Where are you going with that outfit? And where did you get those shoes!!!”, “You need some new “stompers” (translation for the tweet challenged generation…new shows. Oh and I needed the translation.) She directed me to the NikeID website to find some new “stompers”
Nike -- Custom Solution
Global manufacturing stalwarts like Nike and Harley Davidson are re-engineering their plants to address the growing trend of custom “productization.” Where customers can personalize and customize their product with unique detail and style. Customers end up paying a little more for this service, but in many instances it turns out to be more reasonable than exclusive branding. Is Custom Automation the new craftsmanship of the 21st century? If so, what is required to implement this new paradigm into a viable business and operational reality -- a sort of Industrial Intelligence? Read More »
This meter represents your reputation at a 100% scale based on your level of participation on the site. Find out more
Comments Off
I’m really excited by this new Cisco and Librestream MMVC solution. Lots of information out on the web, and lots of questions so I thought I’d put a brief video together to give you an introduction and to see if we can get a discussion going and also to see if we can answer some of the questions for you. The video starts talking about what really matters. What are the pain-points that manufacturers and industry have today? How do they get hold of the right people to fix things if something goes wrong, and how can they say ‘I see what you mean now’ -- and really mean it?
All this matters because keeping things running matters. Being able to communicate effectively in real time using video, speech and pictures -- globally, if need be -- matters. Knowing what’s going on and having clearer visibility matters. Working out what to do next, whether it’s developing a new product or fixing an operational problem fast, matters a lot.
Although not a rule, IT and Control at many manufacturers have an arms-length, if not more distant, relationship. They have different priorities, expertise and cultures. But the reality is that the converged plant, based upon standard networking throughout the plant, requires them to work together to achieve the bucket of gold benefits awaiting their company. Our partnership with Rockwell Automation in many ways is a result of this need at many of our customers. They need us to work closer so that they can focus on a single technology and solution and rely on a “converged” support model as they bring their plants into the standard networking world interconnected to the rest of the enterprise. To this end our companies have been working together for more than five years.
Gregory Wilcox, Rockwell Automation, on IT/Control cultural convergence
Listen to my colleague at Rockwell Automation, Gregory Wilcox -- Business Development Manager, describe the culture convergence that needs to occur -- critical to the overall convergence. We have done a lot of the leg work to make this convergence happen.
So, I got locked out of my Cisco “everything” account recently. At first I thought it was just my home router acting up, but after a couple days I called IT for help, and they asked me to reset my router, and my modem, and then when that was done they informed me that maybe my password had expired.
Long way of getting to the story. I hate when my password expires. We have pretty stringent rules about passwords here at Cisco. I appreciate that. I just don’t want to change my password. You see I have (guessing) at least 20 sites that I use, all have different password requirements. Some have unique requirements for User Names too.
So I have figured out that from now on, the day that I change my company password I am changing all of my other account passwords too. At least within Cisco they synchronize all of the passwords. But I still have all my individual accounts, and I’m quite sure they sit there and watch, here comes that idiot, requesting a new password. Why can’t these people remember their password, they likely wonder while they smirk.
To some degree it is a matter of how often you go to the website, I suppose. Read More »
We hear a lot about Collaboration and Innovationthese days. People try to define what each word means, and how they relate to each other. Probably the best source I’ve found so far is in a great blog by Carlos Domingez that addresses just that. Carlos is one of Cisco’s senior thought leaders, so check out his blog here: Collaboration: What Does it really mean? It’s a fascinating read, especially the references to Evan Rosen and Mark Granovetter. It’s also a great segway to the Manufacturing Active Collaboration Space Solutionthat I talk about in the video below:
Peter Granger talks about Cisco’s Manufacturing Active Collaboration Solution and how it can help with innovation and product development. GE calls their version Virtual Collaboration Space.
As you can hear in my video, the truth of the matter is that Collaboration and Innovation go hand-in-hand simply because when people get together they feed off one another, adding to each others ideas and seeing opportunities from different angles. They solve each others issues and talk through problems using words, images and video. When you click ‘read more’ you’ll hear more about GE’s use of MACS in a short video featuring senior GE and Cisco figures. I’ll also solve the riddle I set for you in an earlier blog about how to make a new square out of four matches! Read More »
Introducing Cisco Industrial Intelligence. Neither James Bond gone corporate nor Cisco gone espionage, Industrial Intelligence is the enabling of business enterprises and municipalities to more intelligently and responsively manage industrial operations globally, and it’s one of Cisco’s latest adjacencies as part of the Borderless Networks solutions portfolio. Having IP-data and control flows converged with voice, video and virtualization creates a more intelligent platform for innovations that connect devices to measure, monitor, and manage resources for greater efficiencies, to connect people in less time and space, and to connect ideas that generate solutions to today’s industrial, operational and environmental challenges.
Chet Namboodri talks about how the Cisco Industrial Intelligence solution can help to improve operational efficiency, safety, agility, and use of assets.
Let me tell you about a great opportunity if you’re an executive or professional in the Manufacturing or Industrial sector. Cisco is hosting a special ‘Industrial Intelligence Day’ on the 12th July 2011 at the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas held in conjunction with Cisco Live. 
