Unstructured Data and Reliability Maturity Levels

Conference season is warming up even though winter is still hanging on for most of the country. The ARC Advisory Group held its annual Forum in Florida last week and many presentations delved into machine learning and reliability programs. As mentioned in a recent post, “How Duke Power Started with IIoT in 2010,” asset management programs have been underway for some time now, as revealed in a stellar presentation from the ARC Forum in 2016. With that understanding, some companies are at different levels of maturity with their reliability programs or ISO 55001 efforts.

Inderpreet Shoker, a research analyst at ARC Advisory Group, wrote a recent post on ARCweb.com detailing asset management approaches from companies employing higher-level software applications to reveal more data in their equipment. Advanced applications like machine learning allow production centers to find “unstructured” data in manufacturing systems, such as instructions or machine feedback.

Shoker writes:

Manufacturers are turning to advanced analytics and machine learning to support predictive and prescriptive analytic solutions. By leveraging data from previously stranded smart sensors, equipment, and other assets, advanced analytics tools are becoming a strategic enabler to improve asset integrity and performance.

Shoker goes on to discuss database integration and how it delivers a streamline approach asset management systems or even a Maintenance, Repair and Operations (MRO) platform for a global company. One example of this would be ColsonMoors. A great webinar from Efficient Plant reveals the huge complexity of spare parts management — 300,000 SKUs for eight Molson Coors plants, but no data governance system in place — for such a large North American division. The beverage manufacturer has seen a lot of “bolted-on” approaches with its MRO journey, due to so many acquisitions over the last twenty years. (Visit “Realize MRO Success by MolsonCoors”, well worth your time)

Another resource related to operational maturity is this presentation on Reliability, called “3 Ways to Improve Your Reliability Program” from Augury Inc. (See video below). The presentation helps recognize the right Reliability program for your company, along with the technology solutions that could fit. Other topics include “historically difficult-to-monitor equipment – remote stations, cooling towers, and process equipment subject to highly variable loading – and best practices and solutions to satisfy these cases.”

>> For more information on the Reliability Presentation, visit Augury Inc.