BVAA Conference Success!

Published: 5th September 2016 | Issue 38

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On Tuesday 17th May, BVAA members made their now annual pilgrimage to Celtic Manor, South Wales, for the BVAA Spring Conference.

Since its resurrection and re-tasking a few years ago, and now including a Suppliers exhibition and networking activities, the Conference has not only become one of the highlights of the BVAA events calendar, attracting entertaining and informative speakers, but it has also been blessed with glorious weather for the Golf Day!

We must also give a due acknowledgement to our sponsors CSA Group, Duvalco, hydravalve, HSP, Rotork and SACO for their generous support, and without whom the various events could not take place.

Unique Challenge
Creating a programme that appeals to a wide variety of member-types and job functions remains a unique challenge, but judging by the feedback afterwards most members felt we’d pulled it off again.

Future Leaders
The day got off to the usual swift start, quickly followed by BVAA Director Rob Bartlett and BVAA Business Development Group chair Tim Guest introducing the BVAA ‘Future Leaders Programme.’ In July 2014, BVAA’s Board explored the topic of engaging the next generation of young executives in our industry, and this inventive new initiative was born. Participants Dave Godfrey (Rotork) and Elizabeth Waterman (PDL) also gave a first-hand account of their personal experiences and assessments of the development programme (see full article on page 14).

The Internet of Things
Next up was Carl Streatfield, of SAP (UK) Ltd who gave an extremely informative presentation on the ‘Internet of Things.’ We have clearly only just started to understand the opportunities for innovation and growth this concept provides and how it is already changing the business world today. The sheer volume of data being generated seems set to revolutionise consumerism, with one possibility being tailored billing based on usage rather than ownership, or indeed the ability to fill up at a petrol station and just drive away, having had your BVAA Conference – Networking and Supplier expo and just two more reasons to attend Carl Streatfield of SAP (UK) Ltd with enlightening presentation on ‘The Internet of Things’ car, pump and bank all communicating with each other without any interaction from you! There was also a sinister side, with a video of the hacking of a car and its functions while on the motorway – scary stuff. Clearly there are elements for the valve industry to take note of for commerce, functionality, and indeed security.

Consistently Producing Flawless Castings
Dr Richard Edwards (Noel Village) also gave a modern day view but on a very old process i.e. castings. Richard explained that despite a 5000-year history, the foundry industry still struggled to consistently produce defect free castings, and how the move to shorter product runs and more complex geometries was exacerbating an already difficult task. He was however able to show that by exerting tremendous effort greatly improving process control, improving foundry consumables and numerical modelling, it was possible to achieve a much greater understanding of fill and solidification mechanisms. Consistently producing flawless castings had been made possible in his company by moving from what many regarded as a ‘black art’ to a sciencebased approach.

New BVAA / Protel Projects Analysis Tool
BD Group member Andy Will introduced Tony Hough (Protel) who demonstrated that, by working in collaboration with BVAA members, he had developed an exciting new data analytics tool utilising Protel's capex project data. The tool – which would be available free of charge to BVAA members as a new web-based service - was able to show statistics and trends in capital expenditure across the main process sectors within the UK. It also allowed interrogation by region and capex value. So, for example, if a member wanted to know the current value/ recent trend in say Food & Drink in the North East region of the UK, a few mouse clicks could readily show factual information (BVAA will launch this new service for Members-only shortly).

Trading with Iran
BVAA was delighted to be able to welcome Martin Johnston, Director General of the British Iranian Chamber of Commerce. Martin updated members on the effective re-opening of this important market – one that had been dramatically affected by sanctions but which was now on many people’s radar. The cost in lost business was highlighted, as was the potential for new activity, and the ways in which members could start to re-engage were explained. Being the world’s second largest gas market, and 4th largest oil market, was a significant draw and an early engagement was recommended.

Safety Integrity Levels
Paul Reeve (Silmetric), Chairman of the BVAA Technical Expert Group (TEG) on SILS, gave members a swift induction into what they should know about this potentially very complex subject. He explained that SILs are increasingly being demanded by customers, end users and regulators to address high risk aspects of process plant that rely on engineered safety measures. Paul explain succinctly what the SIL concept was and how it affected the design, manufacture and supply of valves and actuators. Copies of the new BVAA guideline - prepared by Paul and the BVAA SILs TEG - were also tabled.

Making Money with Social Media
Katie Hoey (Zoedale) closed out the day with a lively presentation on Social Media, and how members can use it in their business mix. She explained how everyone knows that Twitter exists, but very few of us actually used it to its full extent, despite it having 320M users who routinely make some 500M ‘tweets’ a day! Katie demonstrated to members how to start using Twitter to directly increase sales, how to feature products and services, and how to utilise a digital storefront to extend social media marketing and engagement. To prove the case Katie gave some real life examples of how Twitter had increased Zoedale’s sales.

BVAA Golf Day
In recent years, BVAA’s golfers have looked on with wistful envy at the world famous ‘2010’ Ryder Cup course at Celtic Manor. But not this year! As a very special treat, the ‘2010’ was the course chosen for our 2016 Golf Day.

40 members and guests once again enjoyed the (mostly) glorious South Wales weather.

Once again there was a high standard of play, with teams fighting fiercely for the honour of winning the coveted BVAA Cup. The bitter recriminations of those who hadn’t done so well were soon dispelled by the fantastic views and the absolutely world class service rendered by the resort staff.

Results
Longest Drive was won by Richard Holbrook (Rotork). Nearest the Pin and the Individual Best Score (35pts) were both won by the consistent Jeff Lugg (Valvestock).

The Team Event was a close run affair, with a count-back being required to place Team 5 ‘KT Hydraulics/Crane’ in 3rd position with Mark Topliss, Dean Holroyd, Dave Burgham and David McClymont scoring 78 pts.

Pipping them to 2nd on the same score was Team 3 ‘SACO’ comprising Pete Smith, Nick Hitchings, Allan King and Gerald Bird.

The Cup Winners however were Team 4 ‘Emerson’ with a superb 86 pts, and comprising Phil Minchin, Simon Ashton, Steve Barford and Peter Evans – well done!

Our thanks to everyone involved but particularly to honoury ‘Golf Director’ Rob Boycott (Cameron) for supervising and scoring the entire event.

Telephone:	01295 221270
Email:	enquiry@bvaa.org.uk
Website:	www.bvaa.org.uk
	More information on the British Valve and Actuator Association BVAA Member Directory Page

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