Meeting customer needs
Chemical companies support vast numbers of processes -- ranging from complex and continuous to simple and infrequent batches. The needs with each process are different, but almost all require expert support in some form. With continuous processes the ability to quickly detect and resolve process bottlenecks as soon as they occur is critical. With batch processes, it may be troubleshooting of set-up that is the factor limiting the process efficiency.

Because of the wide range of issues that can arise in such an environment, IT solutions to improve the efficiency of processes can be complex and are often not cost-effective to develop. Consequently, humans are often still the first line when it comes to problem solving – especially for complex, high value and infrequently run processes. Given the scarcity of experts, this can be a limiting factor in improving efficiency and lowering costs.

Intellix provides a solution to improve productivity by allowing process experts themselves to ‘replicate’ and automate their expertise. This has a number of benefits:

• Improved efficiency on the processes, lowering costs
  
  
• Expert quality advice is available 24/7
  
  
• Experts are freed up to spend more time on more productive tasks
  
  
• New employees can quickly access and apply the expert knowledge
  
  
• Consistent advice offered

As an industry innovator in the application of IT technologies to the chemical industry Eastman immediately saw the fit of Intellix products to their company. Their decision to deploy Intellix enterprise-wide came after a six-month evaluation by Eastman in their Kingsport, Tennessee (USA) facility during which time pilot systems were built for a range of applications.

“We chose Intellix because of the ease-of-use of their Designer software and the diversity of applications that can be built with it. The Intellix Designer gives the business experts the capability to build, and more importantly maintain their own knowledge-based systems. This allows the true experts to capture their knowledge in a system and to make that knowledge available to a wide range of individuals without relying heavily on IT resources. By using the Intellix suite of applications, we captured knowledge that might have otherwise been lost through retirements or reorganizations – leading to a more efficient company.”

Mike Pearce, Eastman Chemical