Power management company Eaton welcomed Kerry Tingley as vice president and general manager of its industrial controls division back in March. Tingley is responsible for leading Eaton’s strategic growth and new product development initiatives for industrial control solutions used by machine builders, commercial and industrial customers.
Tingley was most recently marketing director for Eaton’s power reliability division, electrical sector. She was named to the role in 2015 and has more than two decades of experience leading marketing, engineering and sales roles at Eaton.
Kerry Tingley answered 7 questions about the organization and how technology is affecting the industry.
What are three key things that a machine builder, system integrator or manufacturer should know about your company?
Eaton is a power management company. We make things that people depend on every day work – things like machines in your factories, uninterrupted power in hospitals, keeping homes connected and protected, and much more. We serve customers around the world, and I’m fortunate to have worked in our electrical business for two decades. It’s an exciting time to be part of Eaton. Here’s the scoop on our heritage, vision and digital approach:
- Eaton’s heritage is characterized by a consistent and unwavering values-based culture and the ability to anticipate and adapt to developing market trends and conditions. We maintain a strong focus on our customers to understand their needs and develop innovative ways to solve their toughest issues. I’ve seen firsthand how we strive to live up to that reputation every day.
- Our vision is to improve the quality of life and the environment through the use of power management technologies and services. That means we are always working to deliver more value to our customers while making a positive impact on our environment. My team and I are focused on intelligent power solutions that collect data, learn and provide actionable insights to help our customers.
- Our digital approach is enabling rapid innovation and making it easier for customers to integrate digital technologies.
Also, we’re transforming foundational power management products with IIoT connectivity. My team helps customers innovate everyday processes while generating the insights needed to make better business decisions. For example, our intelligent industrial control solutions can act as edge devices, data aggregators, and gateways that reliably process and deliver data from all parts of the machine.
What new technologies are driving your product development and why?
By 2020, industrial companies are expected to spend $907 billion on their IIoT initiatives (source: PwC). Clearly, the proliferation of digital solutions is a major trend impacting many industries.
In my business, our industrial control product development focuses on making machines and systems IIoT-ready and improving productivity. For example, our new controllers significantly reduce assembly time and machine costs. Our approach concentrates on connectivity of smart devices to the machine and to the cloud. Ultimately, we’re putting connectivity in the hands of our customers and enabling them to achieve new levels of energy savings and uptime.
With the electrification of everything, from aerospace to vehicles to traditional applications, we see amazing innovation in the electric machine itself. The diversification of motor types requires new algorithms for motor control and unlocks new possibilities. With IIoT, the focus on efficiency and electrification, it is an exciting time to be in industrial control.
How does the Industrial Internet of Things figure in your business strategy?
IIoT forces all of us to rethink innovation and what possibilities exist. We’re working with machine builders large and small, and we see powerful benefits from IIOT and cloud-based analytics to increase machine availability. We’re also helping large manufacturing sites meet their digital factory vision through foundational power system expertise and customizable solutions. Our business strategy focuses on intelligent power solutions that collect data, learn and provide actionable insights to optimize power use and continuity.
How will machine automation and controls alter the way companies staff their operations in the future?
We know there is an opportunity to impact productivity – new data-driven insights and analytics tools will enable us to make smarter decisions faster that impact the environment, businesses, and processes. For example, new Eaton variable frequency drives can be coupled with remote monitoring and control to further improve energy efficiency for irrigation systems and reduce power costs. We’re helping plant managers, maintenance personnel and facility managers improve operations and maintenance, environmental impact and ultimately, their bottom line. Simply put, we’re putting actionable information at our customers’ fingertips to help them make more informed decisions.
How is the development of software solutions impacting your requirements for hardware?
In short, new digital innovations have improved hardware design, manufacturing and commissioning processes and reduced delivery time. Our digital approach is making it easier for our customers to integrate connected technologies. And our proactive and consistent enterprise-wide approach to cybersecurity provides customers with the confidence that our digital solutions meet rigorous testing standards.
Our research with machine builders and original equipment manufacturers shows customers see four key benefits from IIoT: troubleshooting, predictive maintenance, remote asset management and operational efficiency. Out-of-the box, site-ready solutions that are simple to deploy and incorporate an easy-to-understand interface are critical requirements for our customers.
Even simple microcontroller products need to have the processor and memory requirements to sustain those capabilities. IIoT enables game-changing data-driven insights and solutions that are able to process incredible amounts of data.
As engineering and IT continue their convergence, which one will be making your products better, faster and easier to use?
We see engineering and IT working together to deliver transformative solutions addressing critical power management challenges. Engineering owns the product design and how a solution addresses the customer need, while IT supports the product development teams on platforms and design.
Looking into the future, how will technology change your company over the next five years?
We’re helping our customers remove the complexity associated with connectivity and focus instead on the real-time data that impacts their bottom line. Our digital approach is not only impacting the solutions we deliver, but the way we do business, relationships with customers and how our teams work.
