DOMESTIC MARKETS
On its Way, but not at the Station
The good news is that the economic
recovery is finally arriving, Alan
Beaulieu, economist, Institute for
Trend Research, told market outlook
attendees. The bad news is that it
won’t really get here until some time
next year and it won’t look very pretty
when it arrives.
“We have more pain to go through.
But in terms of falling off a cliff, we’ve
almost hit the rocks,” Beaulieu joked.
Furthermore, “We will not be
impressed with the recovery of 2010,
but 2011 will be the good year.”
When Beaulieu spoke at VMA’s
Market Outlook Workshop in 2008,
the GDP was still above the zero line.
Since that time, he has downgraded
his own forecast—he had said it would
be the worst recession since the 1980s,
but now says it’s the worst since post
World War II when the GDP fell to
about minus 13.
In addition, “We will not begin to
grow in terms of industrial production
Reliability’s a Real
Consideration
The reliability of wireless systems
depends on having multiple paths of
communication so that if one device
fails or is blocked, another path can be
taken. This is solved through the use of
“mesh networks” that offer many different paths for transmissions to follow
in order to reach the gateway (or receiver), which directs the communication to
a control system or other appropriate
locations in the plant. The mesh provides redundancy that yields a high level
of communication reliability no matter
what permanent or temporary obstacles
may exist between the transmitting
device and the gateway. This is not true
of all wireless systems.
Another assurance of reliability is an
electronic technique called “frequency
hopping.” If one of the assigned frequencies is jammed or compromised by
noise or other interference, the wireless
transmitter senses the problem and
until about 2014,” Beaulieu told a
groaning audience.
Some specific issues Beaulieu
addressed this year included:
; The credit crisis. Beaulieu joked
that recently, he was alarmed when
he turned on the TV and got both
Fox and CNN headlines screaming
about the evils of today’s banks.
“When those two agree, it’s the end
of the world,” he joked. But busi-
nesses should want banks to do
well, not poorly, and what will hap-
pen is that “banks will go back to
being banks”—not lending to com-
panies with inadequate balance
sheets, he said. “Until toxic assets
are disposed of, they [lenders] won’t
make loans again.” He also pointed
out that the nation’s credit system
is at normal recessionary levels,
that lending will soon open up, and
that interest rates are historically
low for those who want to borrow.
; Inflation. Beaulieu cautioned the
audience not to believe the pundits
that say inflation is not coming.
automatically uses another channel.
With multiple paths between devices
and many frequencies available, the
reliability of wireless networks is at
least equal to wired systems, and they
are not subject to power outages or
inadvertent damage to cables. The mesh
network concept and frequency hopping
techniques are included in the already-approved WirelessHART standard to
which the smart wireless system
adheres, as well as the pending ISA100
standard.
Devices based on this technology
have been proven in use to demonstrate
greater than 99% data transfer reliability.
A large number of wireless transmitters rely on battery power with battery
life typically running between 5 to 10
years, depending on how fast a given
device updates. This is a distinguishing
characteristic between wired and bat-tery-powered devices. Wired instruments send information almost con-
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Companies need to factor in price
increases in the long term for raw
materials, he explained, because if
they don’t, it “will have a nasty
impact in that it will steal purchasing power,” he said.
; Taxes. We are now the 13th largest
debt-to-GDP nation in the world,
and it’s making the rest of the
world nervous, Beaulieu said. Congress will have to raise taxes over
the coming years, he said. Unless
the federal deficit can be brought
under control, the nation is creating
“an odious situation for our children,” he said.
; The stock market. All the leading
indicators say the market is
rebounding, so “we don’t have to
rely on newspapers [to tell us
what’s happening],” Beaulieu said.
However, don’t expect a return to
2007 levels for some portfolios
until the year 2020, he said.
; Good places to be. Beaulieu said
the industries receiving stimulus
money are the ones to invest in this
year. Also good are the medical
industry (because of the aging population), the food industry, higher
education, legal services and global
energy.
Finally, he advised people to look
into investing in real estate because
“you won’t get a better deal in your
lifetime,” he said.
He also advised companies to stock
up on cash, “but don’t hoard it” and
be aggressive in planning. “We have to
get over the hunkered-down mindset—
differentiate your company by being
one of the few who is spending
money,” he said. And he left the audience with this positive thought:
“Americans change and adapt more
than any other people. We will not
only survive, we will learn to thrive,”
he said.
FORECAST: Inflation will be up 3%
by end of 2010 and will rise to 6% in
the year 2011, peak at 7.5% in 2012,
then start falling. The nation’s debt
service as a percent of total budget
outlays will grow to 13% in 2009,
25.5% in 2012 and 34.1% in 2015.
stantly, whereas wireless devices may
operate on a one-minute schedule,
remaining at rest most of the time and
coming to life just long enough to transmit an update. This can be done more
often if required by the situation, but
with a corresponding reduction of battery life. In addition, these devices provide an estimate of remaining power life
that enables scheduled maintenance.
Serious About Security
A very real issue with all wireless transmissions is that some outsider might be
interested in intercepting or altering the
data. Security is taken very seriously by
IT experts, who have identified several
important elements to wireless transmission security.
The first of these is encryption, a
method of seemingly random symbols
that surround each transmission. Even
if the message is intercepted, it takes
too long to decode to be of use. Encryption keys are changed frequently so that
anyone trying to read intercepted messages by comparing them will not be
able to break the code before it is
changed.
In addition, each transmission must
be authenticated, meaning that the
sending and receiving devices must recognize each other, or the transmission
will be ignored. Another step is data
verification by the receiving device. The
authentication and verification rules are
built into the devices, so no foreign
device will be able to intercept a transmission or send bogus information to
the receiving station.
The channel-hopping feature discussed earlier protects against jamming
of channels by either intentional or non-intentional sources, which is the final
key to secure wireless transmissions.
Again, all of the required security
features are built into the smart wireless
system.
Advantages Over Wired
Applications
Wireless offers many advantages over
wired applications in the right circumstances, but wireless should not be
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