Press Presse Press Presse
Industry Sector
Industry Automation Division
Background
Continuously improving the competitive edge of industries
Industrial automation looks back on a long tradition at Siemens, which launched its first
“Simatic” production control system in 1958. Today, the Siemens Industry Automation
Division supplied customers in the manufacturing, process and hybrid industries with both
standard products and highly specialized solutions. Employing a workforce of around
33,000 as part of the Siemens Industry Sector, the Division generated revenues of 7.46
billion euro in fiscal 2011. In more than 30 production plants around the globe, it
manufactures tens of thousands of components, systems and solutions for industrial
automation: Control components, power supply systems, networking solutions, measuring
and sensor applications and water and wastewater treatment. This broad competence base
allows Siemens to supply automation solutions across the complete production process –
from input logistics through development and manufacture to packaging and output
logistics. Siemens also offers trade-specific solutions for a wide range of industrial sectors
such as automotive, solar or food and beverage. In addition, a specialized business unit
provides water and wastewater treatment solutions for municipal and industrial use.
Alongside its role as a hardware supplier, software is emerging as an ever more important
aspect of the Industry Automation Division’s work. Using software applications, products,
machines and complete production plants can be planned and developed on a virtual basis
down to the smallest detail. This virtual approach helps eliminate sources of error at an
early stage, thus driving down development and manufacturing costs. An integral
information structure on the customer’s premises ensures that data generated in planning,
development, production, servicing and aftersales support is centrally logged and utilized
in a continuous process of product development.
“When it comes to automation technology, industrial controls and industrial software, Siemens is
among the world’s leading suppliers today,” according to Siemens Industry Automation Division
CEP Anton S. Huber. “Our strength lies in our innovative drive. By continuing to invest in
innovation and development, and by the strategic expansion of our portfolio, we have achieved a
technological leadership position. Siemens covers the entire industry automation spectrum and is
the only supplier to offer this capability.” By taking this broad-based approach, Siemens is meeting
1/6
two of the focal challenges posed by its customers. First - the increasing variety and complexity of
products. Now more than ever, consumers are demanding individualized products in terms of their
design, equipment and technical features – without compromising on quality and with the lowest
possible price tag. Consequently, development and production need to be both flexible and
efficient. Second - the efficiency in setting up production. Manufacturers are required to install,
operate and convert their plant and machinery under enormous time and cost pressures. “Our
product portfolio helps customers increase their productivity while improving flexibility and
efficiency,” explains Huber. “By doing this, we improve their competitive standing and reduce the
time to market for their products. This is something our customers appreciate.” In fact, no other
supplier can claim such a comprehensive energy efficiency and energy management portfolio.
With intelligent hardware and software solutions as well as consultancy and other services,
Siemens provides its customers with the opportunity to make energy resources more transparent,
calculate potential for savings and optimize energy input. The Siemens Industry Automation
Division develops and markets products for the fields of production automation, process
automation and industrial software.
Comprehensive production automation portfolio
The Division's production automation portfolio benefits companies in a variety of industries such as
machinery, automotive and high-tech electronics with components such as automation systems,
power supply units and controls to ensure a reliable power supply and monitoring of machines.
Added to this are solutions for machine safety, machine and plant operation (human machine
interface), and industrial communication - in other words networking, control and data exchange
between individual plant components. The nerve center of any automation control solution is the
Simatic programmable logic controller (PLC). As a result of its continuous optimization and the
development of an extensive range of supplementary modules, Simatic has grown to become the
world’s most frequently sold system of its kind. Today, one in every three PLC systems sold is from
Siemens. The majority of the company’s power supply units are grouped under the Sitop label, the
comprehensive range of industrial controls marketed using the product name Sirius. In the field of
industrial communication, Siemens offers a broad-based portfolio of cabling systems and active
communication components complying to the leading industrial Ethernet variant, the Profibus and
Profinet standard. The industrial equipment manufacturer also supplies components and systems
for wireless networking, for instance using Industrial WLAN. The Industry Automation Division also
supplies solutions for industrial identification using technologies such as RFID. The solutions
supplied by Siemens include data carriers, antennas and reading devices, which ensure that the
whereabouts of any components or product can be seamlessly traced over the entire production
process through to delivery to the customer – even under adverse production conditions and with
worldwide supply chains.
2/6
Expert partner in process automation
Process automation also encompasses solutions for a variety of different fields, such as water and
environmental technology, the petrochemical and chemical industries, oil and gas as well as
pharmaceuticals and biosciences. Sensor and control technology products are also used in the
food and beverage industry and in the fields of cement, stone and earth and mining. They are
aimed at addressing the demands of process manufacture involving the creation of products by
combining and processing individual ingredients, for instance medicines, soft drinks or bio fuels. To
meet such needs, Siemens supplies process control systems such as Simatic PCS7 which monitor
and control the entire production flow. As these are connected to precise process and analytical
instruments, the Siemens portfolio also includes various sensors and controllers such as the
Sitrans product series. Overall, Siemens customers are supplied with components for the
measurement of pressure conditions, temperatures, flow volumes or levels, as well as weighing
and batching systems and the associated controllers and process recorders. Completing the
Industry Automation Division portfolio are instruments such as process gas chromatographs which
are used in fields such as quality assurance. Particularly in the process industries with their
complex manufacturing procedures, the technologies used are required to reconcile extreme
quality and safety requirements with economical operation. The Process Automation Division
addresses these demands with a range of particularly reliable and durable products. A glance at
the customer reference list testifies to the high regard in which Siemens is held as a competent
process automation supplier: the process control system Simatic PSC7 alone is used in over
10,000 applications around the globe. Users include such prestigious corporations as Bayer,
DuPont and SAB Miller.
Leading supplier of water and wastewater technology for municipal and industrial use
Particular importance is placed on water – scarcity, quality, and cost. The Siemens Industry
Automation Division has a dedicated business unit that develops drinking water and wastewater
technologies to help manage the world’s water resources more effectively. These technologies are
used in more than 200,000 installations, providing water supplies to millions of people and
thousands of companies around the world. With the support of its own research center in
Singapore and the benefit of many years of experience in automation technology, Siemens is
setting the pace within the industry to further develop and industrialize water technology.
Municipal and industrial customers rely on the company’s comprehensive expertise in sustainable
solutions that reduce energy consumption, recycle/reuse water, minimize waste, and reduce lifecycle costs. With a broad portfolio ranging from biosolids management and energy reduction
technologies to filtration and purification treatment systems, Siemens is better positioned than
almost any other supplier to provide single-source solutions, often equipped with integrated
automation and controls.
3/6
More than 90 percent of the Fortune 500 manufacturing companies, including approximately
100,000 industrial customers, use water or wastewater treatment technologies from Siemens. The
company’s high-purity technology helps industry and manufacturers meet specific water quality
requirements to ensure consistent processes and production. Siemens also helps industry meet
ever-increasing wastewater regulations, while improving efficiency and reducing waste. Siemens’
membrane filtration and conventional technologies treat more than 9.5 billion liters of water per day
for water reuse and reclamation, helping reduce the demand on potable water sources worldwide.
Industrial software: a growth market
The industry software segment development has been particularly dynamic. As product
development and production have become increasingly digitized, demand for applications for the
integrated and reliable control of processes and equipment has grown. The abbreviation MES, for
Manufacturing Execution System, is representative of this concept. With its Simatic IT software,
Siemens offers a system capable of collating and displaying data from the entire production
process, and guaranteeing cohesive monitoring and control. Another field of application in which
software is gaining significance is the planning, development, manufacture and service of products
– summarized under the heading Product Lifecycle Management or PLM. Siemens PLM
Software’s portfolio delivers a high definition decision support platform for companies to develop
and support their increasingly complex products. Siemens’ NX software is among industry’s
leading applications for detailed 3D product development models. This CAD/CAM/CAE (Computer
Aided Design/Computer Aided Manufacturing/Computer Aided Engineering) software allows
engineers to create their products virtually – from housing surfaces to complex inner workings,
down to the smallest bolt and internal wiring. The digital design process also enables the
simulation and testing of functional features and characteristics without the presents of actual
physical prototypes. The software actually goes another step further: It allows digital design not just
of the product, but also of the machines required for manufacturing the product. The functional
scope extends from the complete design through to simulation of the machine in operation. The
result: Shorter product development cycles and a decreased demand for actual physical
prototypes.
PLM software also plays an important role regarding the use of composite materials like carbon
fiber components. With their unique combination of low weight, high strength, and durability,
composite structures are already used extensively in the aerospace industry and for rotor blades of
wind power turbines and will continue to experience more widespread use in the automotive and
marine industries. With the acquisition of Vistagy in 2011, Siemens has become the only company
worldwide to support the whole value creation for carbon fiber components with its software tools –
from product definition and development to manufacturing and service.
4/6
The principle of virtual planning can also be applied to the whole of the production process.
Siemens’ Tecnomatix software is designed to permit the virtual layout and simulation of the
manufacturing process as a whole. Using this process, known as digital manufacturing, companies
can plan the necessary production environment while the product itself is still in the development
stage. Using a digitally created model, as well as creating virtual production facilities, entire
logistical processes and production output can be simulated and optimized. Ultimately, this
approach saves both time and costs on every level: Design times for factories from the initial
concept through to assembly are driven down by as much as 50 percent compared to conventional
methods, throughput times are reduced by between 20 to 60 percent, and material handling costs
can be cut by up to 70 percent by optimizing factory layouts during the production planning phase.
This application is already used extensively in the automotive and aerospace industries.
Siemens also offers a number of software solutions for the process industries with its plant
engineering software Comos. These applications permit whole production plants including all the
pipework, tanks and process instruments to be planned as 3D models and simulated in operation.
The platform for data management and exchange between the individual Siemens software
solutions and those of other manufacturers is the Teamcenter application. The Siemens
Teamcenter software connects engineering teams dispersed over several locations, or companies
and their suppliers, thus creating a joint virtual platform on which to share and manage product,
process and manufacturing data – a process which is already standard practice for development
work at Siemens. Data management in this context encompasses both control of the entire virtual
development and product planning processes, and also coordination and synchronization of the
teams involved.
The TIA Portal – engineering from a single mold
With the unveiling of Totally Integrated Automation (TIA) back in 1996, Siemens introduced a
concept whose aim was to make all the components and systems used in production mutually
compatible and addressable throughout. The software grew in significance with the advent of ever
more advanced networking and the digitization of automation technology. While engineering
applications allowed the configuration and engineering of ever greater areas of production, this
placed greater demands on systems and created ever greater complexity. With the development of
the TIA portal, Siemens took a major step towards improved efficiency and greater user
convenience. For the first time, the engineering framework provides users with a standardized user
interface and an overarching operating concept for every application. In developing this software,
Siemens studied typical applications over a period of several years, analyzing and evaluating
customer requirements around the world. Its aim in developing the TIA Portal was to supply
software which was as intuitive and easy to operate as possible and at the same time makes
available a cohesive basic framework for data, functions and interfaces. Within the TIA Portal, all
5/6
devices and field buses can now be configured using a single common device and network editor,
and an over-arching application also exists within the portal for control systems and HMI devices.
The portal permits standardized project navigation, library concepts, data storage, project filing,
diagnosis and online functions, providing the user with a common framework application and a
clear layout of the entire automation project for rapid, intuitive and effective processing. Initial
applications, such as the manufacturing engineering software Simatic Step 7 V11 and Simatic
WinCC V11, have already been implemented as constituent elements of the TIA Portal. In the
future, the TIA Portal will provide a platform for all engineering systems through to the project
engineering, programming and commissioning of the automation devices, drive systems and
controls of the Siemens Totally Integrated Automation spectrum.
Status: March 2012
The Siemens Industry Sector (Erlangen, Germany) is the world’s leading supplier of innovative and environmentally
friendly products and solutions for industrial customers. With end-to-end automation technology and industrial software,
solid vertical-market expertise, and technology-based services, the Sector enhances its customers’ productivity,
efficiency, and flexibility. With a global workforce of more than 100,000 employees, the Industry Sector comprises the
Divisions Industry Automation, Drive Technologies and Customer Services as well as the Business Unit Metals
Technologies. For more information, visit http://www.siemens.com/industry
Media Relations:
Reiner Schoenrock
Telefon: +49 911 895-7999
E-Mail: reiner.schoenrock@siemens.com
Siemens AG
Industry Sector - Industry Automation Division
Gleiwitzerstr. 555, 90475 Nürnberg
Evelyne Kadel
Telefon: +49 173 5649708
E-Mail: evelyne.kadel@siemens.com
Siemens AG
Industry Sector - Industry Automation Division
Klaus-Bungert-Str. 6, 40468 Düsseldorf
Gerhard Stauss
Telefon: +49 911 895-7945
E-Mail: gerhard.stauss@siemens.com
Siemens AG
Industry Sector - Industry Automation Division
Gleiwitzerstr. 555, 90475 Nürnberg
Peter Jefimiec
Telefon: +49 911 895-7975
E-Mail: peter.jefimiec@siemens.com
Siemens AG
Industry Sector - Industry Automation Division
Gleiwitzerstr. 555, 90475 Nürnberg
6/6