Virtual Support Engineer

The high cost of sending an engineer or skilled technician onsite to solve machinery problems is putting the focus on new ways to achieve higher levels of remote access support. Now, a service called Virtual Support Engineer is targeting machinery builder's OEMs to provide a way for securely connecting to machinery, improving troubleshooting and optimizing system performance.

Using the Virtual Support Engineer service, OEMs access their assets in a highly secure environment. While most other user solutions on the market transfer data bi-directionally through a firewall, the service relies exclusively on IT-approved outbound communication. This helps prevent computer viruses, worms, or other digital threats tied to inbound data transfer. Security is further enhanced by adding features such as recorded logins, thorough audit trails, video recording, and the ability for the end user to be given the rights to grant access on demand.

Craig Resnick, vice president of consulting at ARC Advisory Group, said in a press release:

OEMs using the Virtual Support Engineer service receive access to real-time alarming capabilities that can be delivered via text message or email, to themselves, their customer, or a Rockwell Automation remote-support application engineer. Through the system, OEMs use a simple graphical interface to configure alarms for key tags and performance indicators, allowing for quick response to issues and proactive prevention. Alarm capabilities also can indicate potential for future equipment failures, allowing OEMs to make proactive adjustments prior to catastrophic failure -- all without travelling onsite to their customer's facility. Access to machinery alarm data and analytics information also can help inform future performance enhancements to machinery.

In emergency situations, the Virtual Support Engineer service proactively notifies OEMs when equipment goes down. The system sends a constant signal to the Rockwell Automation Service Center indicating a machine's online status. If this connection is lost, Rockwell Automation immediately notifies the appropriate party, who can then troubleshoot the issue from anywhere.

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