Despite increased investments in production processes and industrial equipment, most industrial enterprises are far from optimizing the performance of their assets. Specifically, industrial organizations are still striving to cope with unplanned downtimes and outages, but also to ensure the highest possible asset availability and reliability. Moreover, they must deal with non-compliant asset management processes, as well as with inefficient maintenance procedures. Likewise, there are many cases where inaccurate master data cause inefficiencies. Furthermore, asset related data tend to be fragmented across multiple information systems, which makes it challenging for workers and decision makers to access the right data for their tasks. In this landscape, industrial enterprises seek intelligent asset management solutions that will enable them to manage cost, risks and the performance of their assets in the most effective way. In order to cope with the above-listed asset management challenges, enterprises can greatly benefit from the digital transformation of their production processes. This transformation is currently taking place at an accelerated pace as a result of enterprises’ efforts to ride the wave of the fourth industrial revolution (Industry 4.0). Industry 4.0 entails the complete digitization of production processes, based on the deployment of Cyber Physical Systems (CPS) and Internet of Things (IoT) devices in the manufacturing shop floor. CPS and IoT systems enable the collection of large amounts of digital data from the physical systems and processes of an enterprise, which can be analysed in conjunction with datasets from business information systems (e.g., ERP systems) in order to optimize production processes and to improve managerial decision making. Moreover, CPS and smart objects (e.g., industrial robots, intelligent actuators, drones and automated guided vehicles) enable Industry 4.0 applications to influence the physical world towards automating and accelerating production tasks. Industry 4.0 is not empowered by a single technology, but rather by a pool of complementary digital enablers, including cloud/edge computing, the Industrial internet of things (IIoT), high speed connectivity as part of the fifth generation of mobile communications (5G), Virtual and Augmented Reality (VR/AR), Big Data, Artificial Intelligence, as well as cyber security technologies. In terms of market momentum, Industry 4.0 represents a thriving market. According to the “IoT Analytics” research firm the market for Industry 4.0 products and services is expected to grow to $310B by 2023. This growth accounts for investments on both manufacturing applications and the digital enablers that will support their development, deployment and operation in the shopfloor. Industry 4.0 is revolutionizing production processes, including the ways industrial organizations manage their assets. In the area of asset management, it propels some of the main trends of our era such as: In practice, intelligent asset management is all about collecting, consolidating and processing accurate, timely and high-quality data about the various assets, as a means of deriving insights about their current and future state. Accordingly, it’s also about routing these insights to appropriate stakeholders, including workers and the business management. Asset insights may relate to either Information Technology (IT) or Operational Technology (OT) systems of an industrial organization. Once provided to the right people, they can serve as a basis for data-driven cost, risk and performance management. As a first step to intelligent asset management, organizations need to establish a digital infrastructure that enables seamless flow of asset management information both inside the organization (e.g., from the shop floor to enterprise applications) and across business actors of the manufacturing chain (e.g., OEMs, EPCs, suppliers, manufacturers). Typically, such a digital infrastructure consists of the following elements: This digital infrastructure for Intelligent Asset Management falls in the realm of Big Data systems, given that it deals with large volumes of asset related data, which stems from a variety of heterogeneous sources, including sources that feature very high ingestion rates (i.e. high velocity). With such Big Data systems at hand, enterprises can implement Intelligent Asset Management workflows. The latter involve the following steps: Data collection and data analytics provide a foundation for intelligent asset management in the Industry 4.0 era. On top of this foundation, more advanced asset management functionalities can be deployed, based on leading edge technologies such as: Partnering with the proper vendor is a key to digitally transforming asset management processes through offering a proper infrastructure for collecting, analyzing and sharing asset data, as well as for visualizing asset information and implementing advanced AI/ML analytics. SAP provides a pool of Intelligent Asset Management solutions, which enable the collection and analysis of asset information, as well as the sharing of assets’ insights across all stakeholders of the manufacturing value chain. In particular, SAP offers five principal cloud-based Asset Management solutions, including: Conclusion and Outlook The advent of the digitization of industry and of the fourth industrial revolution, provides industrial organizations with unprecedented opportunities for managing assets’ costs, risks and performance in a holistic way. To this end, they can leverage advanced technologies like predictive analytics, artificial intelligence and digital twins, as a means of monitoring and predicting the performance of assets, people and production processes. Likewise, enterprises can share data across stakeholders like OEMs and EPC suppliers, in order to engage them in collaborative asset management processes. Furthermore, industrial enterprises can establish new business and operational models for managing assets, notably models that optimize the balance between operating expenditures (OPEX) and capital expenditures (CAPEX). SAP provides a complete suite of cloud-based applications that enable the digital transformation of asset management processes and provide a host of intelligent asset management functionalities. Nevertheless, the successful deployment of the SAP Intelligent Asset Management applications requires an accompanying consulting effort towards customizing the operation of the suite to an enterprise’s needs. Gentackle is an experienced consulting firm with over 10 years of SAP Management Experience and over 15 SAP Rollouts. It specializes in Intelligent Asset Management and has a team of expert consultants with deep knowhow in next generation Asset Management solutions. As such it is the right partner for designing, developing and deploying your Intelligent Asset Management project, in a way that maximizes the value you get from your assets and sets you apart from your competitors. [1] AI systems that operate in a way that is understood by humansAsset Management Trends in the Fourth Industrial Revolution (Industry 4.0)
Collecting and Analyzing Digital Data for Intelligent Asset Management
Maximizing Benefits with Artificial Intelligence, AR/VR and Cloud-Based Asset Networks
SAP’s Intelligent Asset Management Solutions