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Frost & Sullivan Industrial Technologies Award 2008 |
Stars in the Industrial Technologies sector celebrate their success.
A combination of excitement and celebration fills the air of Mandarin Oriental, Kuala Lumpur on 25th April 2008, as guest from various segments of the industrial technology industry greeted each other and new acquaintances were made. This event was the first ever annual Frost & Sullivan Industrial Technologies Awards to be hosted in Malaysia. Amongst the beaming award recipients were outstanding manufacturers, vendors and operators of the Industrial Process Control, Electronics & Security, Energy & Power Systems, Measurement & Instrumentation and Environment & Building Technologies (EBT) industries. The Guest of Honour for the evening was Yang Berbahagia Dato’ Abdul Hanan Alang Endut, Secretary General of the Ministry of Science Technology and Innovation (MOSTI). This years awards banquet was also attended by the industry’s most influential including YBhg Tan Sri Zainal Abidin Sulong, Chairman, Malaysia Industrial Development Authority (MIDA); YBhg Tan Sri Augustine Ong Soon Hock, Founder President of the Malaysian Invention and Design Society (MINDS); YBhg Dato’ S H Wong, Chairman, Malaysian American Electronics Industry (MAEI); Mr. Tiong Khe Hock, Chairman – Automation Technology Industrial Group (ATIG); Mr. Benny Yeo, Group Chairman, IA-Community Media Group, besides chief executive officers, country managers, executive directors and presidents from a multitude of vertical industries from industrial technologies in Asia Pacific.
This awards which seek to identify and credit the best practices in the industry segments are synonymous with Frost & Sullivan’s in-depth analysis and coverage of these industries. Sanjay Singh, Vice President, Industrial Technologies at Frost & Sullivan, says “We believe that often the ASEAN perspective is underplayed in the overall APAC developments especially with the greater visibility of China and India in addition to the North Asian countries. Hence Frost & Sullivan has focused on the ASEAN region to identify such performances and contribution of the recipients in the chosen industry verticals.” He adds, “In the area of semiconductors, Southeast Asia accounts for about 8% of the global wafer fabrication capacity and countries like Singapore, Malaysia, Philippines and Thailand export more than half of the semiconductors produced or processed in their countries to the countries across the world.” Further to his analysis, Sanjay points that Malaysia is currently amongst the world’s leading sites for semiconductor assembly, testing and packaging. The Industrial Technologies Awards are based on the extensive market engineering tools evolved by Frost & Sullivan over a period of time. Satish Lele, Director, Industrial Practices of Frost & Sullivan said that the company had launched a country specific analysis of the markets in Southeast Asia this year which allowed them to understand the dynamics and future trends of the region and its implication for automation companies. “As 2007 was another strong year for business, many automation players have responded with significant investments in the region. Through these awards we recognize some of the best companies who have demonstrated excellence in products, services and technology to emerge as market leaders.” The companies awarded were not nominated but were methodically selected based on credible reports, thorough analysis and one to one interviews with the top management of the company by an internal judging panel in Frost & Sullivan. The award will then be awarded to the most outstanding company in that category. According the Satish, in cases where they can’t clearly conclude a clear winner, they would not present the award. The Environment & Building Technologies recipients across Southeast Asia were recognized in building automation, residential air purification equipment and hazardous waste management market.
“Environmental technologies markets in Asia are growing across segments in wake of increased awareness and concerns over issues such as air pollution and energy management,” said Sapan Agarwal, Head of Environment & Building Technologies Consulting Practice at Frost & Sullivan. Sapan also points out that Green technologies, a result of increasing global awareness about the environment is the key to success in today’s business settings. He continues, “Organizations across nations are aligning their products to serve the higher cause of environment stewardship as this is truly the next big thing that is about to change the way we live and work.” The Measurement and Instrumentation category saw companies such as Arrow Asia Pte Ltd, NXP Semiconductors and Dage (Southeast Asia) Pte Ltd receiving awards for Customer Service Leadership Semiconductor Market, Product Line Strategy Power Semiconductor and Vertical Market Penetration Leadership Automated X-Ray Inspection Equipment Market respectively for the Southeast Asia market. Recipients of the Energy & Power Systems category provided no lesser challenge for the analysts in concluding the winners. The fast growing renewable energy industry and a very dynamic oil and gas sector in Southeast Asia region meant the competition was tough. Mr. Tiong Khe Hock, Chairman of Federation of Malaysian Manufacturers - Automation Technology Industry Group, in short FMM-ATIG, presented some awards to recipients for the Energy and Power System category that includes Tanjung Offshore Bhd for Growth Excellence in Oil and Gas Services Market (Malaysia); Petra Energy Bhd as the Niche Player of Upstream Brown Field for Oil and Gas Services Market (Malaysia); Chloride Batteries Southeast Asia Pte Ltd for Competitive Strategy Leadership in Stationary Lead Acid Battery Market (South East Asia) “Recipients of the energy and power industry awards represent a diverse set of growth focused organisations that have excelled by their ability to identify and implement appropriate strategies based on individual market dynamics” says Ravi Krishnaswary, Director for Asia Pacific Energy & Power Systems group.
“Organisations like Actaris, Petra Energy Bhd and SolarWorld, through representing different segments of the energy and power industry, have benefited by carving niche markets for themselves. Vyncke, SolarWorld and Tanjung Offshore Bhd have excelled by forging strong partnerships – be it with principals, vendors, distributors or installation contractors. Both Chloride Batteries and EnerSys, which operate in the mature batteries industry, have gained competitive edge through product innovation and targeting new vertical markets.” sums Ravi. While most of the awards under Automatic Identification, Measurement & Instrumentation, Energy & Power Systems and Environment & Building Technologies categories were a blend of multinationals and local corporations, recipients for the award under Industrial Process Control category, the last award presentation category for the night, were presented out to country specific operations. This year, the Industrial Process Control Awards saw multinationals like Siemens, Yokagawa and Rockwell Automation striding off with more than one title which homegrown names like Invensys and Carotech Bhd also received some coveted awards. Mr. Benny Yeo, Group Chairman of IA-Community and Yang Berbahagia Dato’ Abdul Hanan Alang Endut presented the awards for this category. Amongst the awards that were presented were Market Leadership in the SCADA Systems Market (Australia and New Zealand) received by Mr. Michael Preston, Business Development Director, Southeast Asia of Citect Pte Ltd; Market Leadership in SCADA System Market (Indonesia) received by Mr. Henry See, Invensys Indonesia, Market Leadership in PLC Market and Automation & Software Market (Australia and New Zealand) received by Mr. David Hegarty, Marketing Director, Integrated Architecture Rockwell Automation Asia Pacific and Market Leadership in Automation & Software Market (Malaysia) and DSC Market (Vietnam) received by John Cairns, Vice President – Process Automation and Robert Zhu, Regional Division Manager for Southeast Asia, the ABB Group. Yokogawa picked up 6 awards for Market Leadership for Automation and Software Market (Thailand), and DSC Market in Australia & New Zealand, Indonesia, Singapore, Thailand and Malaysia. Mr. Henry See of Invensys Indonesia, was very happy and honoured that Frost & Sullivan recognizes his Indonesian team effort. Henry continued with thanking his Singapore team for providing support to the Indonesian team to reach this success. “I hope that this award would be a motivation for the rest of the team in Thailand, Philippines, Malaysia, Singapore and Vietnam for them to also achieve the same success as their Indonesian counterparts.” Mr David Hegarty, on the other hand feels that receiving the award would boost the confidence and energy to keep on going with what they are doing. He adds on with saying that the business module strategy that they are practicing works for the local Australian and New Zealand market. When asked on his opinion if the global slowdown in economy and the high inflation rates would affect the company’s market growth, he replied, “I think particularly in Asia region with the indigenous demand, we are more and more less depended on North America economy in our business and we think by executing the strategy that we’ve got, there is certainly plenty of opportunity in this region’s market. The night ended with all award recipients on stage taking a group picture; Each recipient proud and honoured to be recognized by such an establishment like Frost & Sullivan for all their efforts in the respective segments of the industrial technology industry. In return, the team from Frost & Sullivan hopes that the recipients would use this opportunity given to them to motivate their employees to strive for further successes and also that this award might furnish a value added advantage over their competitors in this tough and competitive industry.
Courtesy of Frost & Sullivan |