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Letter from the President
Flow Research, Inc. 27 Water Street Wakefield, MA 01880 781-245-3200 781-224-7552 (fax)
March 29, 2007 Dear Friend of Flow:
Flow Research is pleased to let you know about our Pioneers of Instrumentation Calendar for 2007. While I realize that the New Year is already underway, I hope that this year will be even better for you than last year, and that we will be able to continue to serve your market research needs. We have some very exciting new projects planned for the rest of 2007, and it promises to be a very active and productive year. The idea behind the calendar is to recognize and remember the achievements of some of the historical pioneers of instrumentation who have made possible many of the technical advances we take for granted today. Pioneers such as Daniel Bernoulli, Osborne Reynolds, Gaspard-Gustave Coriolis, Theodore von Karman, and Anders Celsius all made substantial contributions to the history and science of instrumentation. These contributions are recognized in the calendars, along with their birthdays. Perhaps you’ve heard it said that a statesman is a dead politician. While this saying is a little cynical, it illustrates the fact that we tend to glorify people after they are gone, and build them up into a stature that may go far beyond what they really were. This seems to be more the case, the farther in the past the persons are. So, for example, the Greek and Roman heroes seem almost god-like, even though they lived in times that were relatively simple compared to our complex societies today. Somehow the centuries seem to magnify their achievements. Just as there were in previous centuries, there are pioneers of instrumentation alive today who will be remembered for their contributions. Flow Research has undertaken the task of interviewing contemporary pioneers of instrumentation to better understand how they came to their discoveries and how they built their companies. So far, we have interviewed the founder(s) of Sierra Instruments, Fluid Components Int’l, Kurz Instruments, and McCrometer. Most of these interviews have been published in the Market Barometer, which is part of the Worldflow Monitoring Service. Our plan is to continue this series, so you can look forward to future interviews in the Market Barometer, provided you subscribe to our Worldflow service. In addition to the pioneers of instrumentation recognized in the calendar, it contains reproductions of the coverpages for the twelve flowmeter studies we have published. The cover of each of our studies contains a Flow Research photograph that ties in with the theme of the study. The twelve months correspond to our series of twelve flowmeter studies, which are described at http://www.flowresearch.com/flow.htm. The thirteenth study cover, corresponding to January 2008, is for our temperature studies, including both sensors and transmitters. The calendar also contains some “fun facts” about dates and years that various products were invented or patented. The source of these dates was the software used to format the calendar. We hope you will enjoy these “fun facts,” as well as the other features of the calendar. For a free copy of the calendar, click here for our E-Z Faxback Response Form. Recent
Studies
In terms of currently available studies, we have recently completed a new study called “The World Market for DP Flowmeters and Primary Elements.” The results of this study will dramatically change the way the flowmeter market is viewed. When the value of primary elements sold worldwide is added to the value of DP flow transmitters sold, the result is a market that exceeds one billion dollars. This means that not only do DP flowmeters have the largest installed base of any type of flowmeter, they are also the largest revenue generator, exceeding even Coriolis and magnetic flowmeters in terms of revenues. If you are in the flowmeter market, chances are that you are either selling DP flowmeters, or competing against DP flowmeters in the markets you are selling into. We also found that the DP flowmeter market is showing solid growth, and is not flat or declining. The DP flowmeter market has benefited from the explosive growth in the oil & gas industry. Not only is this flowmeter widely used in oil & gas, it is the best available solution for some applications, including subsea applications. The growth is also a result of product improvements to DP flow transmitters, including multivariable DP flow transmitters, and to innovations made to primary elements. The size of the DP flowmeter market has long been underestimated because the value of primary elements has not been included in the market size. For more information on this study, go to www.dpmeter.com and www.flowplate.com. Due to the amount of in-depth research done for this study, we are making it available as two separate “spinoff” studies. These new studies will contain additional segmentation that did not appear in the original study. These two new studies are as follows:
Upcoming
Schedule I would also like to let you know about our schedule of publications for this year. We are planning the following studies for 2007:
You may recall that several years ago we published a study on gas flow measurement. The approach we take in the steam flow study will be somewhat like the approach taken in the gas flow study. We are planning to include DP, vortex, Coriolis, ultrasonic, variable area, and target meters in this study. We will soon be circulating a proposal for this study. For more information on this study, go to www.steamflows.com. We have already circulated a proposal for the worldwide pressure transmitter study. This will be the second edition of a study that was first published in January 2004. The pressure transmitter market has grown substantially in the past several years, and we plan to quantify this growth. Much of the growth in the pressure transmitter market is due to increased demand from the oil & gas industry, and to rising demand for pressure transmitters in Asia, especially China. Suppliers have also made significant product improvements, and have made multivariable pressure transmitters more widely available. All this amounts to a market showing dramatic growth during a time of increasing demand. For more information, go to www.pressureresearch.com. We will soon be sending out proposals for the new Coriolis and ultrasonic studies. These will be the third editions of these two studies, which have traditionally been among our most popular. Even though the Coriolis and ultrasonic flowmeter markets are not as large as the DP flowmeter market, they are the two fastest growing flowmeter markets. Suppliers are continuing to bring out a steady stream of new Coriolis and ultrasonic flowmeter products. We will shortly be announcing publication dates for these new studies, but our plan is to publish them soon after the pressure transmitter study, in the mid-summer timeframe. You can find more information at www.coriolismeters.com and www.ultrasonicflows.com. Other studies in the works are a worldwide temperature sensors study and a worldwide study on mass flow controllers. Expect to see these studies in the second half of 2007. We also are planning to update Volume X, which includes all flowmeter types, towards the end of 2007.
Worldflow
Points
In addition to our new studies, we have expanded our Worldflow Monitoring Service, which is a quarterly subscription service. One added feature is a new website, which is www.worldflow.com. This website is the new location for Worldflow Online, a 24/7 living database of information about the instrumentation and energy industries. The Worldflow service includes the Market Barometer and Energy Monitor, Flash Reports, and access to Worldflow online. We have also instituted a new program called Worldflow Points. Under this program, every ten dollars spent on your Worldflow subscription gives you one Worldflow point. These points can be redeemed toward the purchase of any Flow Research market study listed on our order form. For example, someone who buys Worldflow on an annual basis receives 380 Worldflow points, which is good for a $380 discount on any Flow Research study. Worldflow points are can be redeemed at any time with any study order. As you can see from the above schedule, it looks like you will have a lot of important dates to write down on your new Pioneers of Instrumentation calendar! This is the year when we will be publishing our most popular studies. If we have a flagship study, apart from Volume X, it is our worldwide ultrasonic study. I’m very excited about the prospect of updating this dynamic market. As we enter our ninth year, we have a lot to be grateful for. We have published a large number of custom and off-the-shelf studies, have written many newsletters and letters, and have had the privilege of seeing many new products come onto market. More than anything else, though, what makes this job so exciting and worthwhile is learning to know so many truly wonderful people in the instrumentation business. It is a privilege to work in this business, and I feel very fortunate to be in such an exciting and innovative industry. I realize that you may not always feel you have time to fill out a questionnaire, or to do an interview for a study. Yet our research could not go on without the cooperation of the suppliers and end-users in the markets we study. We try to be as flexible as possible in terms of how the data is gathered. Thank you for your interest in our research, and for taking the time to read this newsletter. Let me close this extremely long letter by wishing you the best in your own projects for the rest of 2007. The flow, pressure, and temperature markets appear to be on a steady upswing, so hopefully this will be a good year for you and your company. My wish is that we succeed together in 2007! If you have any followup questions or comments, please call me at (781) 245-3200, or send an email to jesse@flowresearch.com. Happy Spring!
President Flow Research, Inc. P.S.
In case you are not yet a Worldflow subscriber, let me take this
opportunity to offer you a free trial subscription to our Worldflow
Monitoring Service. To take advantage of this special offer, go to www.worldflow.com,
or send an email to jesse@flowresearch.com.
We have been publishing the Worldflow quarterly reports since 2002,
and they are an ideal way to keep up-to-date on the flow, temperature, and
pressure markets, and the energy industries.
This free offer gives you a chance to try out the service with no
obligation.
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