With its distinct needs, the power sector demands a
solutions-approach for its T&M requirements.
Power sector provides a very
distinct set of requirements for the
test & measurement (T&M)
instruments to debug some of the
challenges/problems associated with
industry. Problems such as the power
transients, voltage sag, voltage spike,
brownout, switching transients,
harmonic distortions etc are associated
with this segment and T&M providers
have effective and efficient tools that
deal with these issues.
T&M organizations has long been
serving the power sector with various
solutions such as oscilloscopes,
harmonic analyzers, digital
multimeters, power analysis
software, electronic loads, power
supplies, data-acquisition systems,
solar array simulators etc. These
solutions are very good test platforms
for designing, debugging and
commissioning of systems in the
power sector. Some of these test setups
are used to simulated the real-life
scenarios to prevent costly mistakes.
Till 2008, before the economic
meltdown started, the Indian T&M
industry was growing at a rapid pace,
with the increasing investments in
design, R&D and manufacturing
for all the major customer
verticals including telecom, aerospace,
defense, automotive, consumerelectronics,
contract-manufacturing,
semiconductors, etc.
In 2010 and beyond, the future of
T&M in India looks bright as
investments from government as well
as private players are expected to grow.
Agilent has all the plans of capturing
this growth by serving our customers
with the best-in-class products and
services. Agilent plans to strengthen its
relationships with existing customers
and explore adjacent market space for
its solutions.
India is an emerging and one of the
fastest growing markets in the world.
Segments promising growth of T&M
in India include telecom, aerospace &
defense, R&D, automotive and
consumer electronics, infrastructure
and education. Power sector is an
integral part of the infrastructure
market and has seen a resurgent
growth over the last many years.
Agilent is well poised to serve this high
capacity/demand build-up in this
sector with its world-class and reliable
test products.
Some of the key challenges faced by
T&M players serving the power sector
can be summarized below.
Awareness: Although the industry
is being served by both local and global
players, but the awareness about the
best solutions that meets the industry
needs is still limited. Some of it can be
attributed to the fear of change as this
industry has long been doing things in a
particular way and has been slow in
embracing new solutions or products.
Solution versus Product: Power
sector has its distinct needs and demand
a solutions approach for its T&M needs.
T&M players and their partners have
been working closely with this industry
to develop commercial off-the-shelf
products out of these customized
solutions need of this industry.
Quality: Power sector has a very
stringent need of the T&M solutions
that meet their high standards of
quality, reliability and repeatability.
Simulation and quality of results are the
most critical in this sector.
Role of Agilent in the power
sector: In the power sector, Agilent
supports OEMs, suppliers and service
providers during design, development,
and manufacturing of electronic
subsystems. Agilent supplies a
comprehensive portfolio of power test
equipment, covering a wide range of
domains and applications. Agilent
products are known for its reliability
and repeatability of results.
Agilent Technologies Inc is the
world's premier measurement
company and a technology leader in
chemical analysis, life sciences,
electronics and communications. The
company's 18,500 employees serve
customers in more than 100 countries.
Agilent had net revenues of $5.4
billion in fiscal 2010.
Agilent offers the widest range of
application and customer support
locally. Its local customer support
centre holds an ISO 9002 certification
and is an NABL-accredited calibration
centre. Agilent also offers the
very unique web-based customer
interface to all our serviced installbase
and a unique offering of onsite
calibration called VOSCAL (Volume
Onsite Calibration).
(Sadaf Siddiqui is Technical
Marketing Specialist, Agilent
Technologies India)