San Leandro, CA — March 19, 2003 — OSIsoft, a provider of real-time information management systems, has teamed with enterprise asset management specialist Indus International to offer a joint solution for improving condition-based maintenance.
Under the agreement, the two providers will integrate the PI System, OSIsoft's platform for real-time enterprise performance management, with the PassPort asset management system from Indus. OSIsoft will configure its RLINK gateway to link real-time data from the PI to PassPort.
Terry Maxey, vice president of Passport product management for Indus, said that associating equipment problems with real-time process and quality data will provide a basis for root-cause analysis, with the potential for early problem detection and prevention.
"Integrating real-time monitoring for condition-based maintenance will provide focus on critical problems, reduce parts inventory, cut labor needed for maintenance and minimize process and scheduling interruptions," Maxey suggested. "Customers will be able to assess equipment performance based on actual plant runtime conditions and reliability criteria, and automatically trigger maintenance alerts."
"Linking the PI System to asset management systems will give manufacturing and utilities customers powerful tools for real-time assessment of equipment performance," asserted Michael Saucier, vice president of marketing for OSIsoft. "With real-time information on equipment performance available at all levels of the enterprise, executive management will be better equipped to align plant operations with strategic enterprise performance initiatives."
OSIsoft's Web portal, PI ICE, will provide corporate equipment specialists with an enterprisewide view of real-time information about equipment maintenance and operations, helping them to solve problems from anywhere via the Internet or the corporate intranet.
PI ACE, the calculation engine from OSIsoft, will be used for real-time condition assessment and to generate equipment alerts from real-time and historical operating data, providing a platform for implementing rule-based condition-assessment and smart sensor calculations.
Houghton LeRoy, a research director at technology consultancy ARC Advisory Group, said that the new partnership would be good for both providers, but especially for Indus.
"The PI System has been the most popular plant historian for collecting process data for many years, and OSIsoft has developed integration strategies and strong relationships with the leading [process automation system (PAS)] suppliers," LeRoy said. "Indus has been unable to develop these important PAS supplier relationships and will significantly benefit from the new alliance."
The researcher added that the product integration would give Indus access to real-time and historical process information from most process control systems. "This will greatly enhance performance management and asset optimization capabilities," LeRoy concluded.
The enhanced version of RLINK that enables the OSIsoft-Indus gateway is slated to be available in early 2003.
