Featured Articles

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Creative Minds for Special Requirements

When HELUKABEL receives a request for a custom cable from one of their customers, the work begins in their cable design department. Their task is to develop solutions that meet unique and often technically complex requirements. For this, a lot of know-how and expertise are essential. Custom cable manufacturing is one of HELUKABEL’s greatest strengths – and would not be possible without the “Cable Design” department, which is based at their production plant in Windsbach, Germany.

 

 

 

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Siemens Launches Siemens Xcelerator – An Open Digital Business Platform to Accelerate Digital Transformation

Siemens AG has launched an open digital business platform, Siemens Xcelerator, to accelerate digital transformation and value creation for customers of all sizes in industry, buildings, grids and mobility. The business platform makes digital transformation easier, faster and scalable. Siemens Xcelerator includes a curated portfolio of internet of things (IoT) enabled hardware, software and digital services from across Siemens and certified third parties.

 

 

 

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Emerson Helping Albioma Become a Fully Renewable Energy Provider

Global technology and software company Emerson has been selected by Albioma, a French independent energy provider, to help transition its coal-fired Bois Rouge plant to 100% renewable energy. As part of Albioma’s wider mission to transition all of its existing fossil fuel plants to renewable energy, Emerson’s automation systems and software will enable the coal-fired power station to convert to biomass feedstock.

 

 

 

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What Goes Into Building an IO-Link System?

One of the easiest ways for manufacturers to transform their operations with IIoT capability is to use IO-Link. This internationally accepted platform allows sensors to go beyond a simple ON/OFF reading and communicate details about fault detection, condition monitoring, and component identification, and more throughout the system. Thanks to IO-Link, manufacturers can shorten commissioning time, minimize the impact of downtime, and boost their production availability.

 

 

 

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Boost ROI, Efficiency With Predictive Maintenance

Predictive maintenance (PdM) is transforming manufacturing operations and growth with technology that includes the Internet of Things (Iot), the Cloud, mobile applications, AI/ML to analyze and predict insights using data, and web applications to share entire operations data in one place. The tools and technology of Industry 4.0 have turned PdM from an abstract concept into a practical solution.

 

 

 

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What Is AC Inrush Current? How Can It Be Limited?

Probably most of us already have noticed the effect of an AC inrush current in our homes – e.g. when the refrigerator, power tools, vacuum cleaner or the air conditioner turn on. The surrounding lights may dim shortly, a sign that the AC voltage is being drawn down by the switch-on process of this device. Fortunately, in the home environment, flickering lights are typically the worst condition that occurs.

 

 

 

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Five Considerations for a Zero Trust Architecture

Zero Trust is everywhere. It’s covered in industry trade publications and events, it’s a topic of conversation at board meetings, and it’s on the minds of CISOs, CIOs, and even the President. What is Zero Trust, and why is it important? Zero Trust isn’t a cybersecurity solution in and of itself, but implementing a Zero Trust architecture will help mitigate and ultimately lower the number of successful cybersecurity attacks your organization might otherwise endure, greatly reducing operational and financial risk.

 

 

 

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How IO-Link Improves Predictive Maintenance and Speeds Up Sensor Reconfiguration

One of Omron’s main focuses with respect to sensor innovation is to incorporate more “intelligence” – that is to say, more ways to gather meaningful data – into their latest sensor lines. Smarter sensors mean better insights into what’s really going on at the machine level, and these insights lead to better decision-making and less downtime. Setup, predictive maintenance, and reconfiguration are all great ways to use IO-Link.

 

 

 

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How the Safety Lifecycle Can Improve Productivity

The term “safety lifecycle” refers to a formalized engineering process that helps create a safety system that can work effectively throughout its lifespan. For example, industrial and manufacturing facilities use safety lifecycles to keep their functional systems operating smoothly. The safety lifecycle is described in international standards set by the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC).

 

 

 

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The Importance of Industrial Cable Resistance to Chemicals and Oils

The global wire and cable market worldwide is estimated to grow from $335 billion in 2021 to nearly $427 million by 2026 according to a report by Research and Markets. The market is expected to grow annually by about five percent over the next five years. This continued growth is being driven by the increasing demand for electric vehicles, industrial automation products and infrastructure cables.

 

 

 

Four Easy Methods to Improve Your Electrical Safety Program
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Four Easy Methods to Improve Your Electrical Safety Program

Whether you are new to an Electrical Safety Program program or a seasoned veteran, the times change along with innovation and ingenuity. Here are four easy methods to ensure you are maintaining or participating in a high-performance Electrical Safety Program.

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How Omron’s “Three I’s of Automation” Create a Roadmap for the Factory of the Future

What will the factory of the future look like? This is the question that many professionals in the automation and manufacturing industries are seeking to answer. While most proposed descriptions are lofty yet lacking in concrete details, there are also many attempts to extrapolate from cutting-edge technologies that already exist. What needs to be done is to connect the grandiose vision with the minutiae, and its sweeping (and yet unrealized) capabilities with today’s real-world applications that sit right on the boundary between practical and experimental.

 

 

 

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5 Priorities Trending in Manufacturing Today

The test of global change has exposed the brittle nature of systems, processes, and supply chain solutions that had historically measured as “good enough.” A recent global survey of 321 manufacturers has shed light on the biggest industry obstacles and punctuated the need for agility, technology adoption, and improved processes to respond to market adversity. The results of this survey make up the 7th Annual State of Smart Manufacturing Report – the most robust edition yet.

 

 

 

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How Edge-Based and Cloud-Based Solutions Complement One Another

For manufacturers looking to get started with the Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT), a common question that comes up is whether they should use the edge or the cloud for data analysis purposes. However, this doesn’t have to be an either-or choice. In fact, both strategies are optimized to fit different needs and can work well together. Some manufacturers don’t want their data going into the cloud for proprietary reasons.

 

 

 

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An Introduction to Functional Safety Systems

In this latest installment of Allied’s Ask the Expert Series, Noah Greene, a product marketing specialist at Phoenix Contact, provides an introduction to functional safety systems. He addresses how functional safety differs from safety of the intended functionality (SOTIF), introduces the three core components of functional safety systems, shares three key characteristics of effective functional safety systems and introduces Phoenix Contact’s PSRmodular configurable safety system.