Issue link: https://iconnect007.uberflip.com/i/1199133
JANUARY 2020 I DESIGN007 MAGAZINE 59 Holden: There is also going to be other soft- ware that people will want to tout related to why their equipment should be selected because of how it uses the CFX data for Indus- try 4.0 for higher profits or better equipment uti- lization, etc. Jorgensen: Those are some of the metrics that would be great to have. As we get more utiliza- tion of CFX through the EMS community, we hope they will share what they have experienced as well as their improve- ments in productivity and reliability, reduced costs, lack of downtime, being able to get their fingers on data for their customers for the sta- tus of projects, etc. Those are going to be great stories to tell, and they're going to come over time. One of the reasons IPC is working with the industry to develop the three programs I discussed for self-evaluation, validation, and education is to support this. It's important to have these support solutions because the com- mittee and industry put a lot of time and effort into developing CFX, so IPC will provide as much support as necessary for the industry to implement CFX. Holden: And will someone be available to answer questions on CFX as an expert? Jorgensen: As part of the solutions IPC will provide to support CFX implementation, we will make available on-site engineering exper- tise for a fee. Even though there could be a cost for this, our hope is that it will be insig- nificant or significantly lower than if you were trying to have a mixed vendor line with mid- dleware connecting all of the devices together, etc. Ideally, the company's IT and equipment techs will pick up enough knowledge from the on-demand web-based CFX education that IPC will provide. For example, an IT person or equipment tech may only need a handful of 30-minute or one-hour web education courses to help guide them through one specific area of utiliz- ing CFX. This alone would be a tremendous cost saving to manufacturers who have to pay time and travel for software vendors and equipment vendors to set up a line or make adjustments to it. The reality is that there will be some cases where a company needs some added assistance for implementation or ongo- ing support. That's where the on-site engineer- ing assistance would kick in. Johnson: Is there anything you'd like to add that we haven't talked about yet? Jorgensen: We covered the revision of the stan- dard coming out, but I would say that also in addition to the CFX Hermes line and the vir- tual demonstrations, there is a CFX subcom- mittee meeting on Monday from 8:00 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. at IPC APEX EXPO that's open to anybody to attend. It would be great to have anybody who is interested in learning more or wants to join the subcommittee to drop by because you can get involved right away. Johnson: Chris, this has been great. Thank you for your time. Jorgensen: Thanks for the opportunity. DESIGN007