Dear
Subscriber:
Like many of you, I was
among the “hundreds of millions” in front of a TV Sunday night until the last second of Super Bowl
XXXVI. The Patriots and the hundreds
of millions of dollars that passed from Home Depot founder, Arthur Blank, to the
Rankin Smith family, gives this discouraged Falcon fan
hope.
PlantSuccess is focused on
IT in the process industry; focus is the operative word. I’ve never seen a
better example of focus than in the final drive when none other than football
expert John Madden said the Patriots would play for overtime. The management
team of the Patriots didn’t see it that way and had the needed confidence in
their resources to execute an aggressive “win only” plan. Place-kicker Adam
Vinatieri was a critical element in that plan and the epitome of
preparedness.
A focus on skills and
preparedness is necessary to win at anything. What a good game and what a great
model of success. Participate in an upcoming PlantSuccess regional conference to
hear plant management personnel address their focus on the successful use of
information technologies.
The dates and venues for the first series of one-day conferences is:
March 6 --
Philadelphia -- PHL Airport Marriott Hotel
April 11
-- Chicago -- Arlington Heights Radisson Inn
May 9 --
Houston -- Hilton Houston NASA Clear Lake
June 5 --
Anaheim, Calif. -- Anaheim Convention Center
Continue to look for
information at our new website, recently launched and still at http://www.plantsuccess.com/ For additional information immediately, please call
770-565-3282.
Regards, Carl Howk
Chairman
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PlantSuccess Close-Up: The Owner-Operator
Forum
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The Owner-Operator Forum was
launched at PlantSuccess ’99; its Life Cycle Data Management
(LCDM) Project was announced soon after and has received countless hours
of experience, energy and intellect from the leaders of its several major phases
and many other hours from industry leaders among manufacturers, contractors and
technology providers. We are pleased that the Owner-Operator Forum, now under
the auspices of FIATECH, has
participated in all of our conferences.
This
project recognizes that the most significant economic benefits of improved
process facility lifecycle data management will accrue during the operating life
of the plant. Improved access to legacy engineering information, re-use of
technical information in multiple plant locations, and data forms that allow
application- or version-neutral use of information over long periods of time,
offer potential breakthrough improvements in the economic efficiency of plant
operations and maintenance.
The
Operations and Maintenance Information Needs Task Force, led by Deborah
McNeil of The Dow Chemical Company, is charged with identifying and
documenting O&M information requirements. Specifically, this task will
identify the specific knowledge generated during facility creation that is
valuable to O&M and how that knowledge can best be delivered. Plant operations personnel interested in
learning more about this project should contact Deborah McNeil
(mcneildj@dow.com) or FIATECH Project Manager, Charles Wood
(cwood@fiatech.org), and attend one of the upcoming regional PlantSuccess
conferences.
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Current Links
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·
Value is in the
Eyes of the Beholder
“No significant combination involving a computer
company has ever met expectations,” says Walter B. Hewlett in accelerating his campaign
to derail the Hewlett-Packard/Compaq merger. He has a lot of words on his side
in a report filed recently with the SEC -- "Large
Computing Mergers Have Consistently Failed."
According to Hewlett, recent merger examples that are
familiar to many of us, include:
The complete report is comprehensive, detailed and provides an interesting perspective on how corporate value and projected value is measured and presented in the IT industry. These examples impact the industry and ultimately impact all of us. READ FULL STORY.
Wayne
Labs, senior technical editor,
Control Solutions Magazine, puts it very simply:
“Software issues are, plain and simple, defects
and need to be fixed.”
This is a good article by
someone who understands software and its application, implementations and their
challenges and how to write about them. READ
FULL STORY.
According to a survey by Booz Allen Hamilton, 9 of 10
CEOs at companies with annual revenue of $1 billion or more have personally
reviewed disaster-planning documents since 9/11. For other views and actions, READ FULL
STORY.
For another perspective and
discussion of security issues important to you and your plant, attend one of the
upcoming PlantSuccess regional conferences as one of the sessions will be on
this important topic and led by an industry expert.
The PlantSuccess Newsletter
generates a substantial number of visits to our website, we welcome the interest
and the access to previous issues of the Newsletter which are available there.
If you'd like to share this newsletter with a colleague, just forward a copy.
Subscribe or cancel by sending a request to Carl.Howk@PlantSuccess.com
Full
links to Volume II, Issue 4 Newsletter articles:
1.
http://www.plantsuccess.com/
2.
http://www.fiatech.org/projects/oof.htm
4.
http://www.manufacturingsystems.com/midday/020402/2.asp
5.
http://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/article_page.asp?tk=446384:979:5&ar=979&L2=5&L3=4