Robots to Networking
Since my last post I've been in Dayton at Motoman and now I'm in Phoenix at the PTO annual general meeting. Believe it or not, the temperature differential is less than 10 degrees. It's been hot in Ohio.
Motoman hosted a technical forum mostly for customers followed by hosting us at the US Senior Golf Open. Main news from the Forum was the report of optimistic sales in the robotics industry in general and at Motoman in particular.
The news from PTO (stands for Profibus Trade Organization, but following the trend of other organizations, will probably stand for PTO in the future) was equally optimistic as installed nodes and products continue to increase in number. Mike Bryant, executive director, expressed a dilemma faced by many marketing executives these days--whether to continue to exhibit at trade shows or invest that money in other ways. Based on comments he made in his presentation, I anticipate that PTO will be focusing on seminars and downplaying trade shows after the upcoming ISA 2005 show in October.
Todd Lucey, general manager of Endress + Hauser, presented the keynote and gave a lot of food for thought. He has found that customers continue to demand more and more from their suppliers. No longer can an instrumentation supplier salesperson, for example,
just present the latest products. People in the sales channel must become experts not only in their products but also in the industries they wish to sell into. They must help customers solve their unique problems and sometimes even help set up networks even though they may only sell part of the system.
Profibus organizations have had a busy year as reflected in its increased acceptance. ProfiNet, the Ethernet implementation, however is still on the leading edge of the S-curve technology adoption cycle. It was announced that 120 products have been released (don't know how many are available for purchase) but it sounds like most are from Siemens. Some here have speculated that it may be two years from building a critical mass. (I'm sure someone will comment here if I'm too pessimistic.)
3:49:48 PM 
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