GE Digital Releases Enhancements to Its Digital Plant Software Applications

GE Digital announced enhancements to four of its Digital Plant software applications: Proficy Operations Hub 2.0, Proficy HMI/SCADA iFIX 6.5, Proficy Historian 9.0, and Proficy Plant Applications 8.2. 

Proficy Operations Hub 2.0 provides common visualization and configuration across the GE Digital Proficy software portfolio of HMI/SCADA, MES, data management, and analytics.  This software is a remote operations enabler featuring tighter integration with the Proficy portfolio, including iFIX and CIMPLICITY HMI/SCADA software, as well as Proficy Plant Applications, Proficy Historian, Proficy Batch Execution, Proficy CSense, and a new sensor health intelligent app.  

Among the benefits industrial companies have reported by using Proficy Operations Hub 2.0 include:

• Up to 60% faster configuration with more enhanced ease of use 
• Up to 40% more enhanced data analysis capabilities including ease-of-use enhancements, new widgets and more enhanced Trend Analysis Widget
• Up to 100% improved performance including Query interface enhancements and Data Distributor enhancements
• Up to 333% increased scale on a single server with up to 1,000 Concurrent Clients on a single server

Major enhancements to GE Digital’s iFIX 6.5 include web-based build and configuration through an updated configuration UX, which helps to reduce costs and speeds time to value.  This Proficy HMI/SCADA solution helps to increase usability and allow faster identification of relevant screens for alarms through improved web-based build and configuration with support for the tags and alarms data structure in the PLC, model support through templates and object types, and a web-based database manager. This helps to facilitate smarter operator decisions and can result in up to a 35% improvement in alarm resolution.

Proficy Historian 9.0 upgrades include Remote Collector Management (w/ UX), an Enterprise Management tool, a collector install simplification and configuration tool, the ability to be an OPC-UA Server and Azure IoT Hub end point, and horizontal scalability. The combination of Proficy Historian and Proficy Operations Hub provides its users with a data management solution with asset model context and visualization.

In addition, Proficy Plant Applications 8.2, an operations management solution for process, discrete and mixed manufacturing environments spanning industries ranging from Food & Beverage/Consumer Packaged Goods  and Pharmaceutical to Aviation and Electronics, supports the digital worker with additional “mobile first” UIs for Waste and Process Orders as well as discrete and hybrid assembly UIs.  Proficy Plant Applications 8.2 helps to increase the solution’s enterprise scalability, allowing up to 300 active users with a development path for another increase coming soon.  Version 8.2 features more modernized clients with Web Activities, Embedded SPC, Web Variable e-Signature, Web Process Order v2, unbound process orders, common History and BOM integration, Web BOM Management User Interface, and a Receiving Inspection Module.  This new version offers features that drive towards Zero Downtime upgrades with new Flash Upgrades, B2MML v3, Unicode Support and Step-wise Activities based on Titles. 

Across the portfolio, GE Digital offers a hybrid on-premise / cloud approach, leveraging both to better balance the needs of the plant floor with the capabilities of cloud technologies.