OpenO&M – A CALM Enabler

Managing the Operate & Maintain asset lifecycle phase remains a major challenge for manufacturers and other asset intensive organizations. Assets are expected to generate their returns and justify the investment decision during this phase. Disruptions to effective asset use limit returns, extend payback periods and, in many cases, impact corporate bottom lines and customer/supplier relations. Despite the importance of high asset performance, maintenance budgets are frequent targets of cost cutting initiatives. Balancing performance requirements against budget constraints is a daily challenge for asset managers that demands close coordination between operating and maintenance organizations. Asset management strategies like preventive maintenance (PM), reliability-centered maintenance (RCM) and total productive maintenance (TPM) have contributed significantly to higher asset availability in recent years. Predictive maintenance (PdM) or Condition-based Maintenance (CBM), using on-line condition monitoring and other asset health sensors, is the next step in improving overall asset performance. Recognizing problems before they become functional failures allows organizations to use scheduled downtime for the most important repairs, reduce parts inventories, and optimize use of limited labor. But the inability to share information between multi-vendor products and between operating and maintenance departments continues to hamper implementation of these newer strategies. MIMOSA, the OPC Foundation and ISA-SP95 recently formed a joint working group to address this very challenging issue. They are collaborating on a new standard, OpenO&M, for integrating diagnostic, prognostic, control and maintenance applications within an enterprise. ARC applauds this effort and sees this as key step towards enabling the many benefits we have discussed in our Collaborative Asset Lifecycle Management (CALM) and Multi-Site CALM strategies.