Yokogawa Electric Corporation has signed a deal with Dell for the global provision of PC models that are selected and customised for Yokogawa use.

Under the contract, Yokogawa will offer high-quality system solutions that utilise Dell PCs and Yokogawa industrial automation (IA) system-related products, said a statement.

Dell will supply PC that have been tested to verify their compatibility with Yokogawa products and Yokogawa will globally distribute these PCs as Yokogawa Certified Models for use with its industrial automation system-related products.

These are ‘long-life products’ that will remain available for twice as long as equivalent commercial off-the-shelf products, it said. To meet a variety of operating conditions and installation requirements, they will be available in a rack-mount or desktop configuration with either a server or client operating system.

The provision of Dell PCs under the terms of this contract will enable Yokogawa to offer high quality system solutions. It will also enable a reduction of maintenance costs and key benefits including stable operation, fewer model changes and one-stop maintenance service.

Chiaki Itoh, vice president and head of the IA Marketing Headquarters, said: “How to combine IT and IA is an important management issue for manufacturers because they urgently need to strengthen their competitiveness in the global market and ensure that they are managed in a sustainable fashion.

“By making the best use of Yokogawa’s IA technologies and know-how accumulated over the years and Dell’s latest technologies and extensive supply chain, Yokogawa will continue to be able to offer its customers solutions that achieve the goals of our VigilantPlant initiative.”

Joyce Mullen, vice president and general manager, OEM Solutons, Dell, said: “We are proud to partner with Yokogawa to help deliver next-generation industrial automation systems. Yokogawa and Dell engineers are collaborating to deliver stable PC models tailored to the needs of control systems.” - TradeArabia News Service