from the department of "don't get lost..."

The Yokogawa Roadmap to the Future Delivering this part of the message was Toshiaki Shirai, vice president and leader of the Industrial Automation Systems business-- yes, Yokogawa has constant R&D, yes, Yokogawa is committed to state of the art solutions and services, yes, Yokogawa takes full responsibility for its products and services throughout the plant life cycle...but "what makes Yokogawa different isn't our products," Shirai said, "but our people...our commitment to vigilance." Getting ProSafe RS certified "within the scheduled time" was "miraculous"-- as opposed to that competitor who announced earlier, and amended their announcement several times...(gee, Mr. Wizard, who could that competitor be?) Since Yokogawa has just celebrated the 30th anniversary of the DCS, it is important to note, Shirai said, that this means 30 years of backward compatibility...Centum is becoming the industry de-facto standard in DCS, he claimed, with over 18,434 projects (including at least 200 projects in the Middle East alone). Customers say that blind spots remain, that there are gaps in information, and we are still housing data in knowledge silos...Shirai quoted Drucker: "A well managed plant is quiet and boring." This, he said, resonates with the Vigilant Plant vision and the Vigilant Plant Operational Excellence model. --Safety Excellence --Production Excellence --Lifecycle Excellence --Asset Excellence. Shirai showed a timeline from 2005 to 2009-2010. This year, 2006, with the focus on Asset Excellence, is the introduction of Fieldmate, an entirely revamped PRM and the launch of InsightSuite. 2007 will bring Production Excellence, and 2008 will complete the lifecycle of excellence...bringing in 2009-2010 a new evolution in design. Shirai noted that R&D has been relocated to various centers of excellence around the world. After 2010, he expects, Yokogawa will be working on Foreseeable Adaptive Operations-- which will need breakthroughs in technique to achieve. "We do this with a passion," he concluded.