Making Our Mark on Automation

Who is Control Station?  What does Control Station do?

Control Station is evolving. Over the years our company and the way we communicate has changed. This blog is our latest initiative to improve our communication with practitioners. As with most things we thought it would be best to begin by answering some basic questions like “Who we are?” and “What we do?”

Control Station is an educator. Doug Cooper started the company in the 1980s with the idea of using software to teach process control. He viewed traditional textbooks and overheads as ineffective tools. They were static and made it difficult to convey the nuances of process dynamics and PID control. Doug’s software solved the problem by introducing dynamic simulations that made critical concepts easier to understand. Today the software and our Practical Process Control curriculum are used by over 200 colleges and universities. They are also an integral part of the training programs of leading manufacturers across the process industries. As an educator, we equip practitioners with the knowledge they need to achieve safe and profitable production.

Control Station is an innovator. For decades tuning a PID controller with software required the process to start at a steady-state before performing a typical bump test.  In most instances a process with steady output can be tuned by using paper and pencil.  Software was needed when a steady-state wasn’t practical or possible. But in order for the software to work, it needed a steady-state.  Do you see the irony?  In 2008 we solved that problem. To this day ours is the only process modeling and PID controller tuning software that eliminates the need for a steady-state condition across the full range of applications. Whether your data is oscillatory or noisy, your process is integrating or non-integrating, or your loop is operated in manual or automatic, LOOP-PRO has consistently proven its value. As an innovator, we develop intuitive tools that enhance production efficiency and throughput.

Control Station is a trusted partner.  In order to deliver best-in-class capabilities to customers, leading OEMs turn to us.  From the world’s fastest growing DCS supplier to the world’s leading PLC vendor, those OEMs leverage our capabilities as an integral part of their automation solutions. Additionally, we actively partner with our customers in order to enhance the value of our core offerings. The relationship with our customers helped establish the functional requirements of PlantESP, a monitoring platform that helps practitioners to achieve and maintain optimal production performance. Those relationships have also facilitated the development of new controller optimization tools and web-based learning capabilities. As a partner, we align our experience and expertise to solve real-world challenges.

Whether as an introduction or a reminder, this is the essence of Control Station and this is how we’re making our mark on automation. We hope you’ll return frequently to our website and to this blog. We welcome the opportunity to engage you in conversations about automation and how together we can tackle the challenges ahead of us.