The smarter management of all assets, including buildings, manu- facturing machinery and mobile assets, will reduce maintenance and energy costs, improving efficiency and sustainability, says global computing giant IBM enterprise asset management VP Lee Blakemore.

Smart asset management entails using measurement data from all systems and subsystems of assets to trigger automated responses to changes in readings, or to manage different assets in real time, informed by continuous data streams from assets, he explains.

“The technology exists to actively manage our energy and asset costs in real time. “The significant savings that can be achieved through smart asset management and the reduction in energy costs have ensured that this technology has been adopted in a number of industries,” he says.

However, there is a need to increase the application of such smart management systems, which, in turn, requires more understanding from potential users.

Increasing awareness could partly be resolved by the visibility such a system would bring to the patterns of energy and asset use. Users can then make informed decisions about the most effective way to use assets to reduce costs, says Blakemore.

“Analysis of the data produced by the assets can be used to determine energy efficiency, maintenance requirements and operational costs. “Further, the real-time nature of the analysis means that a suitable time-scale resolution can be [used] to define the efficacy of asset management parameters over a relevant length of time,” he notes.

IBM is involved in the devel- opment of smart systems, owing to the confluence of data and computation required to deploy such systems, explains Blakemore.

“Real-time data and analytics can be used to determine what is consumed, where and how, as well as set thresholds and trigger automatic actions to manage energy consumption and costs. “We can change the behaviour of users by making them aware through the use of technology and this change in behaviour will help them manage assets and energy consumption more efficiently,” he says.

However, the new technologies and systems required will take a while to implement, but a model that IBM has mooted involves companies installing smart meters and monitoring equipment in companies, fac- tories and houses, and then selling smart asset management as a service, he indicates.