Is the world ready for a “self-help” supplier of industrial networking tools and equipment? The people at Cobaltprocess (www.cobaltprocess.com) in the Northwest USA certainly hope so.

Far from being an "emerging standard" (which is the way I'd describe ISA100.11a) the WirelessHART and HART 7 "ecosystem" (as we are now told we have to call the vendor supply chain systems) appears to be growing and flourishing at an astonishing rate. There are over 30 companies engaged right now in bringing WirelessHART products to market. Challenges are being met, like bringing down the cost of producing firmware and radios, gateways, and adaptors.

What do I mean?

The WirelessHART Radio Stack 

That's the jist of an email from Jim Reizner of corporate engineering department at Proctor & Gamble, and our contributing editor, Rich Merritt. The exchange began as a comment on Rich's story "Intrinsic Safety: A Foreign Concept."