The industrial automation environment holds the potential for installation of wireless products throughout a factory or plant to yield vast arrays of information that can improve operations and profitability.

Already widely deployed in commercial and business applications, industrial wireless adoption has been stalled, purportedly because process control users are slow to change and are paranoid about security. The real reasons for slow introduction are a combination of old-paradigm thinking, compounded by paralysis analysis through standards committees.

Honeywell Process Solutions and Emerson Process Management have made recent major wireless announcements focused on the process industries. ABB is involved on a broader front, across factory automation, process and power industries, with a considerable portfolio of wireless products. Invensys is active with the Wireless Industrial Networking Alliance (WINA), but does not yet have a broad offering. The other majors are not pushing anything yet.

I see 2 marketing problems concerning industry leaders' wireless offerings. While focusing on resolving FUD (fear-uncertainty-doubt) regarding adoption of the new technology, many are missing the FABs (features-advantages-benefits) that completely new and different wireless capabilities bring.

The spread of new wireless technology in the industrial environment will generate the ability to do things that were inconceivable before. This will cause changed work processes and new skill sets that may not simply extend from old habit-patterns. The future values of wireless in the factory and process plant are yet to be imagined.

Then there is pricing. Industrial automation companies typically look for 50% gross profit margins, based on relatively low product volumes and high overheads. New products are usually introduced with all the conventional layers of overhead. Too few marketing managers have the guts to propose revolutionary pricing formulas. So, applications that can justify a completely different pricing structure by generating much higher sales volumes are overlooked, or inhibited. Of course, this presents opportunities for new, agile and innovative leaders to emerge.

Pinto's Pointer to the leaders: If you're looking for growth, don't get paralyzed by perpetuating past pricing paradigms.