Revolutionizing an Industry

Emerson Process Management Delta V 2010

  • Delta V Modules
  • Understanding starts with on-site research to experience the context of use.
  • Image sort to uncover stakeholder motivations and discuss desired brand attributes.
  • After the strategy is established, sketch conceptualization allows for rapid generation and testing of ideas against a framework for decision making.
  • Revolutionary “Charm” Architecture dramatically reduces cabling complexity.
  • Expert use of tracking and planning tools to coordinate the supply chain ensures success.
  • Analysis ensures quality and reliability.
  • Rigorous prototyping identifies and solves issues before they can reach customers.
  • Thorough testing of first article parts identifies tool issues before starting production.
  • Design for ease of assembly.
  • Aesthetic hard models convey the vision.
Solutions:
  • Design Research
  • Design Strategy
  • Industrial Design
  • Manufacturing Support
  • Mechanical Design
  • User Experience

01 Revolution

Emerson Process Management, a global leader in process automation services and technologies, provides process control systems that ensure safe and efficient processes for the oil & gas, pharmaceutical, chemical, and food & beverage industries. These systems enable plant operators to remotely monitor and manage their processes from the comfort of a control room environment, while improving efficiency and quality. To stay on top of the industry with their DeltaV family of digital automation systems, Emerson decided that it was time to leapfrog the industry once again and came to M3 to help make it happen.

This multi-year engagement with M3 resulted in two product lines announced with great fanfare at Emerson Exchange 2009, their premier user forum. Initial sales reports have exceeded expectations.

02 Challenge

Facing the new customer landscape of a retiring workforce, inexperienced newcomers replacing them and rapid advances in technology, Emerson knew that a different approach to product development would be required. Emerson’s drive to Human Centered Design (HCD) guided them to M3 Design’s product development strategy experts to help uncover the best way to solve their challenges while creating the next-generation flagship DeltaV system. To do this effectively, they needed to leverage new advances in technology to create not just a faster version of the DeltaV systems, but an entirely new approach to making process control more effective and intuitive. Compounding this challenge, the team needed to introduce this revolutionary innovation to a risk-averse industry and facilitate its adoption.

03 Solution

Emerson came to M3 with an idea for a revolutionary architecture that would use characterization modules, or “CHARMS“, to connect the control system to field devices installed throughout the plant while dramatically reducing cabling complexity. M3 applied its process to determine the best way to deliver the key advantages of “CHARM“ technology and “I/O on Demand.”

Our field research and internal stakeholder interviews led to insights and recommendations that resulted in improvements to the customer experience through every step of the product journey (initial sale, plant definition and build, installation, operation, and maintenance).

Based on these strategic recommendations, M3 established a design language for the system to strengthen and improve brand recognition through aesthetics and usability by expressing key brand attributes including technology leadership and HCD principles. This holistic approach ensured that interactions with the products themselves would better align with Emerson’s reputation for quality and reliability. Consistent treatment of touch points and status indicators provided improved diagnostic information, and better feedback to ensure that the products are intuitive and easy to service.

The new design language and system architecture were made a reality by the dedicated effort of a diverse M3 development team working closely with Emerson. The system architecture was developed and validated with numerous levels of prototyping and testing with various stakeholders. The team evaluated and refined concepts until all requirements were met and final designs were created for over 170 injection molded plastic and stamped metal tooled components. To align suppliers and permit a smooth transition of the design to final assembly and integration, M3 developed complete documentation that was used throughout development and pre-production manufacturing.

Several innovative features emerged from the effort to create dramatic savings to installation costs. Numerous patents for Emerson were submitted for use on this and future systems. A few examples of these features, such as tactile latches and keying systems, required the M3 team to create new, innovative mechanisms.

04 Success

The DeltaV S-series dramatically increases revenue for Emerson’s customers by maximizing plant uptime through speed of deployment while reducing installation costs. The modular system architecture provides Emerson with the flexibility necessary to rapidly provide solutions tailored to customers’ needs. The new design language showcases these functional improvements by communicating the attributes of reliability, simplicity and ease of use to reinforce Emerson’s position as the market leader. Building on this language, this work also inspired and informed a redesign of the DeltaV product brand identity.

Throughout the program, M3 served as a strategic partner and an integral extension of the Emerson team to ensure a successful launch of the product to the marketplace.

The result is a new award-winning, revolutionary system that is leading the market by providing clear, fundamental advantages in a user-centric, intuitive way to all of the stakeholders in the chain from the Emerson sales team and local business partners, to plant process engineers, and plant maintenance teams. The new system has received accolades from the process control industry and has been recognized by the design community as well in the form of prestigious European design awards such as the Red Dot and iF.