Emerging Markets
"Industrial companies are most interested in adopting new wireless solutions such as machine health, environmental and emissions monitoring, safety, and structural integrity," says Mareca Hatler, ON World's director of research. Thirty-nine percent of interviewees who are planning wireless solutions are targeting machine health.
Positive user growth rates for planned wireless applications compared with current ones include the following:
User growth rate: Machine health 122% Process monitoring 32% Asset monitoring 300% Facility environmental 14% Tank level monitoring 75% Relief valves/steam traps 14% Safety & security 86% Total 33%
ON World predicts that emerging markets will make up 65 percent of the global industrial wireless sensor network revenues in 2011.
Wireless Standards
There are several standards efforts under way. The first, WirelessHART, has recently been ratified and products based on this standard are expected in 2008.
The second, ISA SP100, has a broader focus including process automation, RFID, and facility management. As the SP100 continues to work on its first specification, the ZigBee standard is gaining traction in several vertical and emerging markets. The advanced features of the upcoming "ZigBee Pro specification," the trend by the IEEE of pushing more functionality into 802.15.4 chips, and in-fighting among the large OEMS is creating opportunities for new entrants in the industrial WSN ecosystem.
ON World's survey with 108 industry experts representing the leading automation and control OEMs, systems integrators, and component suppliers found that 55 percent plan to support the in-progress SP100, 40 percent support WirelessHART and 32 percent support ZigBee.
In 2011, ON World projects that industrial wireless sensor networking systems and services will be worth $4.6 billion.
The report is available from http://onworld.com/smartindustries.