Thony Brito Cardier of Rockwell Automation says that while embarking on a digital transformation plan, operators must ensure that all their elements, like governance, targets, projects, and outcomes, are aligned.
What is Rockwell Automation showcasing at ADIPEC?
Rockwell Automation has been focusing more and more on providing customers with comprehensive solutions for digitalising oilfields. This has been part of Rockwell’s vision. We realise that customers today are looking to extract more value from their day-to-day operations. What we are trying to do is to leverage our efforts in digitalisation tools to help them to address that sort of challenge.
We have come up with a connected production solution, which realises our vision of a connected enterprise, which we have developed over the last few years. It’s all about providing an intelligent plant, intelligent facility or factory, based on IoT and Industry 4.0, basically. We provide integration or assistance in the journey of digitalising operations, from deploying sensors in your remote facilities to secure your networks, all the way to communicating that wealth of data into a single platform, and then being able to make sense out of it. Now we are trying to improve that offering, beyond its relevance to just wellheads or to plants, and offer a rather all-encompassing system.
Rockwell Automation’s portfolio is more tailored for process industries and the downstream sector, not so much for the upstream segment. Would you agree?
Our focus is equally on the upstream and midstream segments. Our strength lies in well monitoring and control. We have been assisting many end-users in the Middle East, providing control and monitoring systems to the likes of operators in Kuwait, Oman, et cetera. To give you an idea, there are about 6,000 wells, mostly onshore, but also offshore, fitted with Rockwell Automation’s equipment in the Middle East today. It has taken us about 10 years to achieve this feat. These are monitored or controlled by our devices. Our equipment is also deployed in pipelines and in facilities.
What projects is Rockwell Automation is working on in the region?
We are working on some upstream projects in Kuwait and Oman. We have recently been awarded work here in Abu Dhabi as well, from one of the ADNOC subsidiaries. We are also trying to get into Saudi Arabia and Egypt. We are trying to get into places where we believe these technologies are now becoming popular.
A connected production or enterprise is not something that you do at once. We recommend that our customers identify their gaps, create pilot [projects] and show the organisation the value of it. It is a complete journey, and requires a change in strategy that needs to be adopted at the management level. It’s about integrating the operations process.
