Raising the Ante...

Steve Belich from Elpro Technologies, one of two worldclass companies based DownUnder, has sent me an announcement that Elpro has just raised the ante for wireless technologies. All of their wireless products will be covered by a lifetime warranty, retroactive to January 1 of this year. This is likely to be the first of many such announcements, since most sensors and many field device products are solid state, and so durable that a lifetime warranty is certainly possible. With the increasing emphasis on cost of maintenance and asset management by process manufacturing companies, it is hard to see how Elpro, or anybody else this proud of their equipment, can possibly lose by this. It is an apparent no-brainer to do this if you have the ability to, and if you don't do it, be prepared to be asked questions about why not. Like, "Isn't your stuff as good as theirs?" and other similarly impertinent questions. In wireless-land, nobody better be thinking of selling replacement parts as a way to get rich. If you have to replace a part, it means that the system went down, and that is a Bad Thing(TM). In order for wireless to be successful on the plant floor for control and monitoring, the wireless products themselves will have to be as trouble-free and invisible as their counterparts, wires, cable concentrators, and terminal blocks have been. Good one, Elpro. The rest of you, what are you waiting for? Walt