Looking beyond

`Scares about the millennium bug, and its little sister the 9999 end-of-file marker, have led to suggestions that IT expenditure across the manufacturing sector has been solely focused on survival. That's simply not true,' said CIM show marketing director Andy Center. Well, the 9th of September `99 has been and gone without many, if any, problems - so are the boom times ahead?

The terminally pessimistic will say yes, conjuring up images of New Year disasters, but it's not that sort of boom Center has in mind when he says: `although a large proportion of IT expenditure in the last 12 months has been dedicated to Y2K compliance, the manufacturing sector has always seen IT investment as a strategic issue. The 20 per cent rise in requests for information about this year's CIM show is simply proof - if any were needed - that strategic IT spend is still high on every manufacturing company's agenda.'

Last year CIM attracted over 13 000 visitors, of whom two thirds were at board or senior management level and 85 per cent were personally involved in IT purchase.

As then, this year's visitors will be drawn to an exhibition that acts as the umbrella for four other shows. These are Process IT, Control Systems Integration (CSI), Networks in Manufacture, and Design Technologies.

Companies showing their varied IT solutions across these all-embracing sectors will be competing for a piece of the £3.5billion IT investment cake from the manufacturing sector. One of the largest slices, some 20 per cent, goes on to the process plate, a fact recognised by the increasing presence of process IT and control companies at the event.

This year Process IT is featuring suppliers of solutions such as ERP (enterprise resource planning), MES (manufacturing execution systems), process MRP/production control, together with vendors of process control technologies such as PLCs and Scada systems. The latter will, of course, also feature strongly in the sister CSI show.

Process IT also incorporates the Process Industry Centre sponsored by Ross Systems and Process Engineering. Made up of a business lounge, information point and consultant clinics, the centre sets out to serve an educational role. To this end, it will host seminars and case studies from the likes of Carlsberg, Tetley, Ernst and Young and Microsoft.

This new direction for the CIM show was explained by Center: `Too many trade shows are just becoming vehicles for vendors to promote their products to a passive audience. CIM has a different objective; we want this show, and the case study debates in particular, to be an objective and interactive "shopping mall" for the manufacturing and IT visitor. We want people to get the bigger picture of the way industry is heading.'

For more information on any of the activities at CIM '99, or to register for free tickets, call the ticket hotline on 01203 426505 or have a look at www.cimshow.co.uk PE