Dubai, UAE; April 22, 2015: With GE (NYSE: GE) supporting nearly two-thirds of the power generated in the Middle East region, prompt response to partners' needs and providing real-time assistance go a long way in boosting power plant operational efficiency and profitability.

GE Power & Water is now scaling up the support it extends to its partners with the opening of the first-of-its-kind Monitoring & Diagnostic Center in the Middle East and Africa region in Dubai. Located in GE's office in Dubai Internet City, the new M&D Center brings transformational change to the service extended to GE's partners, enabling them to achieving significant leaps in productivity and efficiency.

Azeez Mohammed, President & CEO, Power Generation services, MEA, said: "The new M&D Center is a critical investment by GE in the region to support our power sector partners in scaling up their efficiency. Opening the Center here in Dubai also underlines our commitment to the region to be closer to our partners and provide them real-time support.

"The Center leverages our Industrial Internet technologies that integrate the power of human brain with big data, advanced analytics and heavy duty machinery. This is particularly relevant to the region, which faces the challenge of meeting increasing demand for power and emphasizes on sustainable development of the energy sector."

GE Power & Water's M&D Center serves as a reliable 24x7 operation office for its partners in the region, providing the entire suite of Predictivity solutions, which enable GE's power generation customers to operate more efficiently, dynamically and profitably.

A true marvel in the integration of mind, machine and data, the Center provides GE with unprecedented control in identifying any potential concerns with the operations of its turbines, and enabling GE's support service team of engineers to quickly respond and rectify them.

The result is minimized downtime, safe operations and unmatched strength to predict and overcome any unwarranted situation. While this strengthens GE's service commitment to its customers, for them, it means greater operational efficiency and the ability to achieve higher levels of productivity.

"The Center helps plant operators do several things, including 'predictive maintenance'," which allows them to avoid unplanned outages, caused by issues such as possible failed sensors to gas turbine compressor damage, before they occur. As well, by using data and analytics, the M&D team can identify potential issues and fix them before them become a problem," said Mohammed.  

The real-time efficiency and reducing unplanned downtime to zero are assured by the innumerable number of sensors plugged into GE's gas turbines, which generates power for hundreds of customers in the MEA region, relaying back valuable data to the M&D Center. This also leads to increased cost savings for GE's partners.

GE operates a similar center in Atlanta, which has an accomplished track-record of enabling power plant operators to keep their turbines up and running with the highest performance and reliability. The Center has enabled GE's partners to save an estimated US$70 million in 2014, up from US$53.9 million in 2013.

The UAE is one of the key markets for GE in the Middle East region, with a presence spanning nearly 80 years. GE has played an instrumental role in driving the growth efficiencies of varied business sectors of the UAE with over 150 million liters of water treated daily using GE technologies and supplied across the nation, and over 200 GE turbines supporting the generation of 40 percent of the country's electricity. GE Water & Process Technologies recently also marked a significant expansion of its regional Center of Excellence in Dubai at the Jebel Ali Free Zone.

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© Press Release 2015