What Premier Brought home from the Ignition Community Conference. Every year, developers, integrators, and end users who work with Ignition gather as a community for a first look at where the platform is headed. This fall, Premier Automation's Adrienne Harvey (Automation Specialist, Programming) was invited to speak at the Ignition Community Conference (ICC). Her experiences at the conference highlight the value of having Premier engineers in the room at events like these, and how what they learn can enhance the systems you run every day. About the Ignition Community Conference (ICC) The ICC is the largest annual gathering of people who work with Ignition, Inductive Automation's industrial software platform. It brings together integrators like Premier, in-house developers who support a single manufacturer, and of course the Inductive Automation team. Attendees traveled from around the world for this event. This was Adrienne's third ICC and her second as a speaker. Her session demonstrated how to build a map-based application with Ignition Maker Edition for a neighborhood litter tracking and cleanup effort. Her application also leveraged IIoT technologies like Node-RED, MQTT, and Sparkplug (along with GPS data from Meshtastic nodes), and illustrated how far the platform can reach beyond typical use cases such as plant-floor HMI screens. How Premier Uses Ignition Many of Premier's customers already run Ignition or request it for new projects. Premier most often deploys it as a SCADA (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) system and uses it to develop custom HMIs. Premier's engineers connect Ignition to your PLCs and databases, then design and build the screens your operators need to run the process. While many larger projects, such as SCADA and manufacturing execution systems (MES), will use the full, standard edition of Ignition, Premier can also develop with Ignition Edge when a customer only needs to control a single machine or short production line. Ignition's flexibility can also create a challenge. Adrienne notes that most tasks in Ignition can be handled in a number of ways, and she can often tell whether a developer comes from a PLC or traditional software development background just from how they organize a project. For a team that works across multiple PLC platforms and supports systems for their full lifecycle, Premier finds that consistent development practices can make it easier to hand off a project or return to a system years later and know exactly where everything lives. What Adrienne Brought Back to Premier A first look at Ignition's AI direction. The technical keynote introduced two optional modules (Catalyst Core and Catalyst Agent) coming in the next version of Ignition that bring large language models (LLMs) into the platform. Catalyst Core works inside the Ignition Designer and lets developers use the LLM of their choice with awareness of both Ignition and the specific project. Adrienne expects this approach will save time by reducing off-target suggestions, which can lead to accidental technical debt. Customers who choose to use the Catalyst Agent module can give their operators or engineers a chatbot interface limited to only the tools they approve. Practical frameworks for better projects. Adrienne also attended two workshops: Architecting Ignition to be Scalable Now and Into the Future, and Best Practices for Next-Level Ignition Builds. When Premier modernizes a single line and the customer later wants Ignition across the facility, a project built with growth in mind can make that expansion faster and cleaner. She is already sharing these practices with the Automation team. Connections to proven solutions. Another big reason to attend ICC is to connect with Inductive Automation's verified partners. Many of these partners have already built tools that you may want integrated into your projects. Those relationships, along with the community-built and Inductive Automation-vetted Ignition Exchange, let Premier bring you tested, supported solutions even faster. Confirmation of what's already working. Adrienne also saw that Premier is already practicing validated development principles, including adopting new technology responsibly and designing with the operator in mind. Plant floors are loud, distracting, and sometimes hazardous, so the best screens put the right information in front of the operator when it's needed and make the safe choice the easy one. Adrienne believes an operator screen should be built around the task at hand, with the controls an operator needs readily available instead of competing with visual extras. A Community Worth Investing In Adrienne describes the Ignition community as one of the most welcoming, collaborative groups in industrial automation. Companies that look like competitors from the outside regularly share ideas and tools. The ICC has many fun traditions (including an unofficial orange dog mascot named Iggy, the annual Build-a-thon, the Inductive Automation band known as the Department of Funk, and the popular women's breakfast). Along with valuable in-person time with the Inductive Automation team, she came home with new knowledge and stronger relationships that will help Premier stay ahead of what's next. Catalyst Core and Catalyst Agent will give Ignition users new choices about where AI fits on the plant floor. If you want to know whether either module makes sense for your system, or you're planning a new Ignition project, talk with Premier's Automation team [LINK] about what you're running today and where you want it to go.

What Premier's ISO 9001:2015 certification means for you. Premier Automation's panel building team is now ISO 9001:2015 certified. Eagle Registrations Inc., an independent registrar, has audited and registered Premier's Quality Management System and manufacturing activities, giving you formal, third-party assurance of the standards applied to every build-to-print project Premier delivers. To explain what the certification covers and what it means for your next project, Premier Automation, Inc. spoke with Josh Miller, Premier's Quality Assurance Manager. What the Certification Covers The certification applies to Premier's build-to-print work, formally defined as the manufacture and assembly of industrial control panels, automation systems, and drive solutions to customer drawings and specifications. Covered operations include production, inspection and testing, shipping, and support across Premier's Pennsylvania facilities. Each of those steps now runs within a quality system an independent registrar has reviewed and approved. Turning Tribal Knowledge Into Documented Process According to Josh, Premier's commitment to quality was in place well before the audit. Premier's long-standing customers and industry partners have plenty of options for where to build their projects, and they continue to return. "You don't really get the high-profile, repeat customers that we have gathered over the years unless the equipment we are delivering is world class," Josh said. The certification process changed how that knowledge is captured. Over the past year, Premier's team took practices that had developed organically on the shop floor, the tribal knowledge experienced people carried with them, and built them into documented forms, procedures, and everyday processes. Josh sees this as essential for any growing company, because it allows the next generation of engineers and technicians to carry forward the habits that have made Premier successful. The result for you is more consistency from one build to the next and more information about your project. With tighter record keeping, traceability, and formal communication systems, Premier can now share far more quality data with you than before. A Defined Response When Something Goes Wrong Issues will come up on any manufacturing project. Under ISO 9001:2015, Premier responds to every reported quality issue with the same structured process: immediate containment, root cause analysis, and a documented corrective and preventive action plan. The quality team then tracks each issue over time to confirm the fix holds, and if the problem returns, the corrective action is reinforced. Josh describes the process as consistent in structure and specific in practice. Every issue follows the same steps, and every response is built around the particular problem so it cannot happen again. A recent customer quality alert shows how quickly that process moves from a report to action on the shop floor. The added testing protects the customer's equipment in the field, and the records Premier keeps along the way give the customer documented data to bring to their supplier. When you raise a concern with Premier, you can expect it to reach the shop floor quickly and come back to you as information you can act on. The People Behind the Process Auditors look for objective evidence, and Premier's Quality Management System has earned strong feedback. The comment Josh hears most often, though, is about the team. "Every auditor that has come through Premier in the last year always makes the same comment: 'You have some great people here,'" Josh said. For Josh, that feedback gets at what the certification represents. "The certificate is just a piece of paper. It is the commitment and people that make the difference," he said. He points to the full range of people behind every build. Designers create the prints, assemblers tighten the screws, electricians handle the wiring and bussing, and engineers support each job both in the shop and on your site. Dozens of others work behind the scenes to keep the rest of the team moving. Josh notes that auditors tend to be skeptical of the phrase "quality is everyone's responsibility," but at Premier he sees it play out every day. What Comes Next In Pennsylvania, the quality team will continue maturing the system through ongoing improvements and training, including internal audit training for several Premier managers this December. Companywide, Premier is working toward expanding the scope of its certification to include its Alpharetta, Georgia shop. If you are evaluating a build-to-print partner for industrial control panels, automation systems, or drive solutions, contact Premier Automation to talk through your next project and the quality documentation you can expect with it.