We spoke to our vastly experienced Regional Sales Manager, Rafael Herrera and asked him some questions about his experience with control rooms across the region.
Q1. Rafael, based on your experience across South American sites, what makes latency such a serious issue for control room teams today?
RH:
Over the last few years, the amount of information flowing into control rooms has grown dramatically. Operators are now handling more video feeds, more sensors, more alarms and more telemetry than ever before, especially in mining and oil & gas where remote operations are expanding. In many of the sites I visit, a single operator is expected to manage dozens of sources at once.
This increase in data has made reaction time a critical variable. Even a 3–5 second delay between a sensor trigger and what appears on an operator’s screen can be the difference between acting early or reacting too late. When you’re dealing with a pipeline stretch hundreds of kilometres long, or a lithium mine at high altitude, those lost seconds are incredibly costly.
What I seeing a lot of are control room managers feeling more pressure, and they want their teams to trust what they see, act instantly, and avoid carrying the stress of delayed decision-making. And that’s exactly where latency becomes an operational problem, not just a technical one.
Q2. What are the biggest operational challenges you see control room managers facing in the region?
RH:
Three challenges come up in almost every conversation I have:
Safety windows are shrinking.
Hazards escalate quickly, gas leaks, slope movement, pressure anomalies. Managers have said to me, “Will my team act in time?” Latency shortens that window and creates hesitation.Downtime costs are rising sharply.
Heavy industrial sites across the region are routinely operating on narrow production schedules. When there’s a delay in identifying a fault, the downtime cost per minute can be enormous. I’ve heard often: “We’re losing money while the system catches up.”Cyber and compliance risks are increasing.
The region has seen a significant rise in cyber incidents. If systems fail or operators lose visibility during a controller or network dropout, compliance reporting slows and reputational risk grows.
These challenges are the reason senior personnel feel the weight of every second. They’re responsible for safeguarding people, production, and trust.
Q3. How does modern control room technology actually help operators ‘get seconds back’? Can you give specific examples?
A:
Absolutely, and “getting seconds back” is exactly the right phrase. Technology should give operators more time to focus on the critical parts of their job, not overwhelm them.
Here’s how we’re helping teams across this region achieve that:
Instant, synchronised awareness:
With our control room solution Aetria, operators see the same frame at the same time across walls and workstations. No mismatched video, no waiting for streams to catch up. That alone gives operators precious seconds when responding to alarms.Faster incident diagnosis:
Teams can pull any source to any screen immediately, no logging into separate systems, no manual switching. I’ve seen operators reduce their incident confirmation time from minutes to seconds.Automatic failover:
If a controller or network path fails, Aetria switches instantly. Operators don’t lose situational awareness, and managers don’t cope with blind periods. It prevents what I often call “latency during failure,” which is when mistakes happen.Edge resilience at remote sites:
This is especially important here in this region. When the WAN link drops, which it often does, local edge devices keep data flowing. Operators remain in control without waiting for links to recover.
In every example, the theme is the same: we remove delay, reduce cognitive load, and give operators time back to make clearer, faster, more confident decisions.
Q4. Finally, what advice would you give to anyone managing control rooms in this region, who wish to modernise and reduce latency?
A:
My advice is simple and based on what I see working in the field:
Measure latency as an operational KPI, not an IT metric.
Managers should know exactly how many seconds it takes from alarm to action.Design redundancy around visibility, not just data.
You need dual-path video, controller failover and edge support, otherwise, your operators lose the picture when it matters most.Invest in tools that simplify the operator’s job.
If systems feel complicated, operators hesitate. And hesitation costs time.Demand live demonstrations, not spec sheets.
Ask vendors to show real switching speed, real failover, real latency under load.
What I emphasise most is this; When your operators gain back those crucial seconds, your entire operation becomes safer, more resilient, and much easier to manage.
