The Emerson Innovation Center, Fisher Technology and the Fisher Control-Disk rotary valve have been named finalists for the 2011 Edison Best New Product Awards. The Edison Awards symbolize the persistence and excellence personified by Thomas Alva Edison, inspiring America’s drive to remain in the forefront of innovation, creativity and ingenuity in the global economy. Opened in May 2010, the Emerson Innovation Center is a highly specialized engineering testing facility and flow lab which enables valves to be tested in real-world plant conditions to ensure reliability, environmental compliance and safety before being installed at a customer site. The Fisher Control-Disk rotary valve is a finalist in the Applied Technology category. The Control-Disk offers excellent throttling performance and is ideal for applications that involve fast processes and varying pressure drops, such as in the chemical, pulp and paper, and metals and mining industries. An equal percentage flow characteristic provides an improved throttling range comparable to that of a segmented ball valve. This allows control closer to the target set point, regardless of process disturbances, resulting in a reduction in process variability. The ballot of nominees for the Edison Best New Product Awards is judged by roughly 2,000 members of the not-for-profit Marketing Executives Networking Group (MENG), an organization comprising America’s top marketing professionals and academics.