| news4all | 2019 | December 17, 2019 |
|
Dear Readers,
It was a great pleasure to meet many of you again as well as our new members at our General Meeting in Frankfurt am Main. This year was a very successful year for the OMS-Group. In terms of marketing, it was rounded off by a highly frequented stand at the EUW 2019 in Paris including our "Product Wall" and the presentation given by our Board member Carsten Lorenz. Please read the details below. The Group had already been well represented at the E-world in Essen, at the HeiKo in Kassel and the metering days in Fulda. The coming year will be shaped by the certification of a third Smart Meter Gateway by the BSI, which is planned for this month. We are pleased to support the subsequent rollout with the open and interoperable OMS standard. We wish you a wonderful and peaceful holiday season! Best regards, Charles van Dyck Head of the OMS Working Group Marketing |
New Frequency 434 MHz Soon Available
The OMS Conformance Test Tool (CTT) offers the fastest and easiest option to verify the OMS or M-Bus compatibility of metering devices. Due to numerous international requests, it will support a second, testable frequency of 434 MHz in the near future. The previous transceiver can still be used with this new frequency. The CTT is the best preparation for a smooth OMS certification. More information will follow soon.
|
OMS Conformance Test Tool
Welcome to Our New Members: E. Wehrle and Caleffi
E. Wehrle GmbH is a global player, specialized in technologically leading products and system solutions for the water meter market as well as for injection-moulding of plastic precision parts. The product portfolio ranges from classic mechanical meters, over meters with various radio modules for remote reading, to electronic meters with energy saving totalizer including a digital LCD display and an integrated OMS radio. Comfortable data management is provided by Wehrle’s own web portal, where OMS devices can be integrated quickly and easily. Around 270 employees work at the headquarters in Furtwangen in the Black Forest in Germany, to ensure continuously high-level quality.
Why did E. Wehrle GmbH become an OMS-Group member? As a manufacturer of intelligent, remotely readable water meters, Wehrle is very eager to establish an open system and OMS radio in the market for future smart metering solutions. By joining the OMS-Group, Wehrle intends to support this standardization and thereby ensure the latest OMS information is received first hand in order to keep their products up-to-date. 
Caleffi is an Italian manufacturer of high-quality components for heating, plumbing, air conditioning and renewable energy, for residential and industrial systems. The Caleffi Group also provides state of the art components for metering applications. It has over 1,307 employees worldwide and distributes to over 90 countries with a recorded turnover above 329 million euros in 2018.
Why did Caleffi S.p.A. become an OMS-Group member? The portfolio of Caleffi also included metering devices. This makes it increasingly important for us to apply OMS and to drive forward open metering standardization. In particular, we want to better understand how the communication world for this type of device evolves. |
Outstanding Success at EUW 2019 in Paris
This year's European Utility Week in Paris from 12 to 14 November was a milestone in the history of the OMS-Group. The booth, including the "Product Wall", was frequented by a large number of visitors who were interested in becoming members of the OMS-Group. Special attention was paid to the more than 25 OMS compliant devices that were exhibited by 20 OMS-Group members at the attractive OMS "Product Wall".
Another outstanding success was the presentation given by Carsten Lorenz, member of the OMS Executive Board. In the scope of the Hub Session "Interoperability requirements in support of the Clean Energy Package".
The topic of the speech was "Energy efficient & standardized communication for battery driven devices". Carsten Lorenz emphasized that OMS is the best solution for battery-powered devices: "Wireless M-Bus and OMS support optimized battery life in any communications architecture for up to 20 years." More than 100 trade visitors followed his presentation with great interest. Due to the great results of this year's OMS participation, a booth for the upcoming EUW 2020 (October 27–29) in Milan, Italy has already been booked including participation in a Hub Session, once again in a prime time, has been confirmed.
© Photos: Jörg Fischer |
OMS-Group Joined DIN – German Institute for Standardization
The OMS-Group is a member of DIN e. V. – the German Institute for Standardization; the membership gives the OMS-Group access to standardization committees and represents the interests of OMS members in this large community of more than 3000 companies. Participation in DIN takes place in the national committee NA 041-03-66 AA "Communication systems for meters” that is a mirror committee of the same-named CEN/TC 294. Thus the OMS-Group strengthens the standardization of communication interfaces for systems with smart meters and remote reading of smart meters for all types of energies. |
Board's Report on Status Quo and Outlook for 2020
In the autumn of 2019 the Board had two major events. In November we held our annual meeting with the heads of the OMS working groups. The main topic discussed were the preparations for the OMS General Meeting 2019. We discussed the achievements made throughout the year and the tasks to be addressed in 2020. It is always good to see that although we might have different opinions on some topics we always come to terms in an objective matter-of-fact way. Our working groups represent the core of OMS and their expertise and feedback is very valuable for the Board. After the fruitful discussion with the heads of the OMS working groups the Board continued with its other topics. Registering of OMS as an EU certification mark is on its way however we have to admit it’s not a well paved road to ride on as this branch of trade mark rights is new for everybody in this sector. As previously announced, the VDE Testing and Certification Institute (VDE PZI) now offers product certification of OMS conformance. Therefore, the board decided to invite a representative of VDE PZI to be a guest of the OMS working group ‘Testing’ and to join the members of our other certification body, DVGW CERT. 
The OMS General Meeting 2019 finally took place in the 1st week of December. It was hosted again in the rooms of ZVEH in Frankfurt (Main). Twenty-two members of the OMS-Group participated and took the chance to discuss their needs with the Board and other members of OMS. The usual things were presented, such as the 2018 financial report, the 2019 current budget and an outlook on 2020. The cash auditor presented his report and the Board was discharged of its work in 2018. The budget for 2020 was approved by the General Meeting and also the unchanged contributions for 2020. The Executive Board held its report, as did the working groups. Volker Meyer, CEO of figawa, was confirmed by the General Meeting as the representative of figawa in the Executive Board of OMS after the recall of Gotthard Graß at end of August of this year. Finally, the Board announced the short and medium term orientation of the OMS-Group:
|
|
Events 2020
Meet the OMS experts! Here are some of the dates you should put in your calendar:
|
E-world, Essen, February 11–13, 2020