CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA-GE Fanuc Automation Americas Inc., a unit of GE Infrastructure, announces a roadmap of upgrades and releases for its Proficy Automation and Production software family which spans from programming and control to HMI/SCADA to historian and manufacturing execution system to a real-time information portal. This year, the company announces a major upgrade to Proficy, with a data-model and event-based platform based on the Proficy Historian and Proficy Real-Time Information Portal technologies. The new platform will allow users to standardize on a single manufacturing IT platform for managing real-time operations. The Proficy platform will include packaged integration with enterprise systems and Proficy HMI/SCADA applications as well as provide an extended library of tools and published APIs for third-party development of applications.

"A year ago, GE Fanuc launched the Proficy family as a vision for Integrated Production Management-from control to ERP (enterprise resource planning)," says Bernie Anger, vice president of software technology for GE Fanuc Automation. "In 2004, we strengthened Proficy with a dozen new releases across all Proficy applications and have plans to launch another 15 releases in 2005. Our core focus in 2005 is to enhance the fundamental infrastructure of Proficy with a data-model centric platform for managing production operations that will take our customers' productivity to the next level."

Targeting the fourth quarter, GE Fanuc plans to release the Proficy platform, which consists of a Proficy Server and Proficy Console.

"The Proficy Platform is highly scalable to allow users to manage from just a few equipment assets up to entire global operations with multiple production facilities," says Kevin Bernier, director of Proficy software for GE Fanuc Automation.

GE Fanuc also will release Proficy Enterprise Connector, which offers a packaged two-way information highway between the Proficy Platform and enterprise systems such as SAP, which enables users to achieve the real-time enterprise by making business sense out of plant data in real time. The company also will release major upgrades to Proficy HMI/ SCADA capabilities, as a key component of a world-class production management solution.

In 2006, GE Fanuc will release enhanced HMI/SCADA solutions with a new SCADA engine. SCADA developments will include new graphical editors, redundancy, and an expanded block library. The HMI/SCADA releases will also feature new device connectivity toolkits and rich data types with OPC UA support. For 2007, GE Fanuc will offer visualization consolidation-with one integrated HMI/SCADA platform for operation, supervisory control and analytics, based on Longhorn and Avalon technologies.

GE Fanuc Automation, is a joint venture between GE and Fanuc Ltd. (Japan), delivering automation hardware and software.