Schneider Electric has extended its EcoStruxure  Automation Expert portfolio to the water desalination market.
EcoStruxure Automation Expert V23.0, the  latest addition to the  platform, provides end-to-end  digital continuity and enables factories, water  and wastewater treatment facilities and manufacturing plants to be  more efficient and effective.
The solution represents a new approach to designing,  building, operating and maintaining industrial automation systems by enabling  automation software to be separated from the hardware, according to a Schneider  Electric press release.
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EcoStruxure Automation Expert connects everything in an enterprise.  It collects data from sensors to the cloud, analyzes data and provides insights  that enable plants to act on real-time data and business logic. The platform bridges  the division between IT and OT systems in a way that drives higher levels of  operational effectiveness.
Schneider Electric also noted that the platform  is cyber-secure, vendor agnostic  and has been developed following the IEC 61499  standard for portability and interoperability. These distinctions enable the control system  to be modeled as a single integrated system, but implemented as a distributed  system. 
Next-generation enhancements in EcoStruxure  Automation Expert V23.0 include:
- Enhanced  integration with AVEVA System Platform to reuse graphics from existing  applications for faster system design. EcoStruxure Automation  Expert can connect to AVEVA Engineering and import plant design data for  automated bulk engineering. It also enables scalable visualization for the  enterprise control room by integrating with AVEVA System Platform.
 - A new graphical editor for procedural  automation, which improves operational effectiveness.
 - Multi-OS compatibility with the EcoStruxure Automation  Expert HMI and archive, now available on Linux and Windows, which allows users  to develop similar objects across all compatible operating systems.
 - Enables internal  or external collaboration, allowing users to optimize solutions and solve  specific market challenges.
 
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Schneider Electric’s ongoing updates and  enhancements of its control system software is a response to a critical demand in  the Industry 4.0 ecosphere and is also emblematic of the company’s wholesale support  for a universal automation layer that is common across vendors.