SAP IAM (Intelligent Asset Management) in a Capsule

Hello everyone,

Greetings!

In this blog, I am going to highlight the IAM functionality and Its association with Industry 4.0. I hope you might have read my earlier blog on “Industry 4.0 in a Nutshell”.

If not, you may refer https://blogs.sap.com/?p=1113838

IAM is a blend of Digital twin, Internet of Things, Machine Learning and Data Analytics.

Before we get into details, in short, I want to touch base on potential takeaways with IAM,

• Helps to manage the entire life cycle of physical assets with the help of Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) within SAP
• IAM is a cloud-based solution helps organizations to achieve operational excellence by predicting potential operational problems before they occur
• It enables cost control along the Asset life cycle (but It is debatable)

At first, let us look at the components available under the IAM portfolio.

• Asset Intelligence Network (Spelt as AIN)
• Predictive Maintenance Service (Spelt as PdMS)
• Asset Strategy and Performance Management (Spelt as ASPM)

The symbolic view of IAM (Intelligent Asset Management):

When we look at the above picture, we come across the term “Asset Central”, in my view I can say it is the heart of the IAM suite.

• It enables the foundation between IAM and Plant Maintenance component in EAM/S4 HANA
• It helps business partners to access and collaborate in cloud-based network

Asset Central foundation integration with Plant Maintenance Component in EAM/S4 HANA:

A new Asset Central tab is introduced for objects such as Equipment, Functional Location, and Notification that are applicable for the SAP GUI transactions. In the Asset Central tab for equipment and functional location, we can view the following information:

• Header Information
• Announcements
• Instructions
• Indicators

SAP Notes enabling “Asset Central Tab” in EAM/S4 HANA

Post-installation, the additional function should be activated.

• Activate Additional function AC_INT

By activating this, we get Asset Central Tab at Equipment/Functional Location/Notification level

• Equipment/Functional Location

               

• Notification

Note:

Post configuration of SAP EAM to get Asset Central Tab, one should configure SYCLO which is an add-on to ERP to synchronize Equipment/Functional Location/Notification, etc… to IAM tenant.

Let us have a quick glance at focus points (a few) of Industry 4.0, as they clearly define the role and association had with IAM components viz., AIN (Asset Intelligent Network) and PdMS (Predictive Maintenance Services)

• Interconnectivity: Connecting Machines, Devices, Sensors and people (Operators/Manufacturers/Service Providers) to communicate with each other using Internet of Things by collecting/Exchanging the reliable data
• Transparency: By collecting/Exchanging data at various operating conditions of an Asset, it provides valuable insights to operators to take a firm decision at right time to improve the efficiency of the physical asset and thereby improving production efficiency.
• Predictive Maintenance: By usage of IIOT sensors and the technology of interconnectivity the healthiness of an Asset can be identified in life and allows machine operators to perform cost-effective maintenance rather than adopting Run to Fail concept.

Let me walk through each component of IAM suite in detail,

Asset Intelligence Network (AIN):

SAP Asset Intelligence Network helps to maintain a global registry of industrial equipment and being shared with multiple business partners such as Manufacturers/Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs)/Operators/Service Providers to achieve operational excellence by taking full advantage of the Internet of Things (IoT).

Operators access up-to-date maintenance strategies and manuals from OEM (Original Equipment Manufacturer) and in return, OEM receives asset usage and failure data for their analysis.

 

Benefits that could be achieved from AIN:

• Provides a base for electronic data handover in the digital network
• Asset Data integration with a common taxonomy
• Enables collaboration with multiple business partners
• Creates more transparency for Operators and Manufacturers on models of the technical object and related SOPs/Maintenance Manuals
• Push communications can be established to alert manufacturers and service providers
• Builds a knowledge base for technical objects

Asset Intelligent Network emphasis the term “Digital Twin” by adopting features from the guidelines of VDI 2770 and DIN 91406.

VDI 2770 Guidelines: The aim of this guideline is to simplify the transfer of documents between manufacturers, retailers, operators, and external service providers and to standardize the nature of manufacturer information (classification, structure, metadata, and file format).

DIN 91406: Automatic identification of physical objects and information on physical objects in IT systems, particularly IoT systems.

In the latest version-2005 of AIN, a new feature called UID (Unique Identification Number) has been introduced to find the technical object.

To understand new features of AIN Version 2005, please refer my blog

https://blogs.sap.com/2020/05/28/sap-asset-intelligence-network-whats-new-with-version-2005/

 

Predictive Maintenance Service (PdMS):

By definition, we can understand what it does. The main objective is to reduce asset downtime by predicting its failure. There are a lot of debates going on about the IAM-PDMS prediction strategy.

In this component, we can really sense about IAM association with key attributes of Industry 4.0, one of the main focus points of Industry 4.0 is predictive maintenance by the usage of IIOT sensors.

When we talk about IAM-PdMS, one may come across a few big topics viz.,

• Taxonomy
• Rules and Alerts
• Failure Modes
• Machine Learning
• Advanced-Data Analytics

In my view, I can say PdMS is the bread and butter of IAM, as without this IAM cannot exist. The entire play is based on the strategy that one might adopt to predict asset failures.

The aim of PdMS is to maintain a registry of equipment that uses a common definition viz., Classification & Standardization.

Why we need Classification?

• With the Classification, PdMS tie-ups the asset-related information electronically to create a Digital Twin.
• Organizations can understand, analyze, compare technical characteristics, operating environmental conditions, Potential failures, and related maintenance activities.

Why we need Standardization?

Standardization emphasis on data collection and exchange of information to achieve RCM (Reliability Centered Maintenance)

• Data standardization allows the electronic collection and transfer of data, which results in an improved quality of data for RCM

Taxonomy:

The word taxonomy came from “Biology” where it briefs about identification, nomenclature, and classification of organisms, however, we too use the same nomenclature to identify industrial assets.

Two important characteristics of a taxonomy:

• Each level is included in the level above it
• Levels get increasingly specific from top to bottom

Failure Modes:

A failure mode describes a probable failure that could happen to a piece of equipment.

• In an AIN scenario, the manufacturer could share failure modes with an operator. Otherwise, the operator maintains failure modes.
• Using RAMS figures (Reliability, Availability, Maintainability, and Safety), Failure Modes can help an operator to understand MTTR (Mean Time to Repair); MTBF (Mean Time Between Failure), and MTTF (Mean Time to Failure).

Rules and Alerts:

Rules create alerts to notify users of anomalies, potential failures, or indicator threshold violations

• Create rules for a model or a piece of equipment
• Rules can create a PdMS alert from:
  • Indicator value
  • Indicator threshold status
  • Alert from machine – Error code
  • Aggregator values
    • Count, first, last, min, max, sum, average, a standard deviation of an indicator
    • Over the last XX seconds, minutes, hours, days

Machine Learning:

At very high-level the definition is, Computers learn patterns of input/output variables from historic data and based on trained models system makes predictions and detects an anomaly.

Analysis Tool:

Based on the selected duration for the selected Indicators system display the graph

 

SAP IAM-PdMS adopts the attributes of ISO 14224 guidelines to facilitate taxonomy and to collect, exchange, and analyze data to optimize RCM. In my view, Here comes the challenge for an organization to set up boundaries of an asset to collect and exchange data. One might achieve this by understanding the Topology concept.

 

Asset Strategy and Performance Management

SAP Asset Strategy and Performance Management (ASPM) is a cloud solution that enables plant managers and reliability engineers to measure and improve the performance of their assets and optimize maintenance strategies.

In IAM ASPM we can see new master data viz.,

Assessment Templates

This is used while assessing equipment, location, and groups. This can be of following types:

• Risk and criticality assessment template
• FMEA
• Checklists
• RCM

Assessment

This feature for assessing and viewing the calculated scores. This can be of the following types:

• Risk and criticality assessment
• FMEA
• Checklists
• RCM

Impacts

This feature is to view the impacts of the conducted risk assessments. For example, an event may impact multiple aspects each with its own severity. This is defined as impacts, for example, the safety of people and plant, environmental compliance, operational loss, financial impact, and so on.

Scale and Dimensions

This feature is to define the question and answers based on which the assessment is done.

 

Risk and Criticality assessment:

We use this assessment for each of the physical assets to determine the most suitable analytical process Viz., RCM, FMEA, PM Review. The criticality can be identified based on “Risk Score”.

While evaluating risk rating/score, one should consider a few important factors which are not limited to,

• OI – Operational Impact Factor
• OF – Operational Flexibility Factor
• MC – Maintenance Cost Factor
• ISE – Impact on Safety and Environment Factor

The calculation of risk score is based on different dimensions and scales for different impacts

And based on thresholds defined for “Risk Score” actions viz, PM review/FMEA could be initiated.

 

FMEA (Failure Mode and Effects Analysis):

Failure Mode & Effect Analysis (FMEA) supports the analysis of the potential reliability problems and enable quick and flexible actions and mitigate failures. FMEA is used to identify failure modes, their causes, and impact on the asset or system.

• Identify and recognize potential failures including causes and effects.
• Evaluate the effects and prioritize identified failure modes.
• Identify and suggest recommendations to either eliminate or reduce potential failures from occurring.

FMEA Template:

Assessing FMEA for each of the physical assets:

 

PM Review:

Based on the results of the Reliability Centered Maintenance (RCM) and Failure Mode and Effect Analysis (FMEA) assessments, certain maintenance activities are recommended. These recommendations can help correct and prevent equipment breakdowns and failures by fine-tuning the frequency of PM checks or adding a few additional checks as per recommendations.

 

RCM (Reliability Centered Maintenance) Assessment:

The process is used to determine and to ensure physical asset efficiency/function as per its design with a minimum of maintenance by understanding design limitations. RCM assessment follows the guidelines of SAE JA 1011.

The results of RCM not limited to,

• Scheduled Tasks
• Improvement proposals
• Failure Management Policies – One Time Changes / Run-to-Failure

The RCM mainly considers three types of maintenance tasks which are,

• Time-Based – Scheduled
• Condition Based (PdM and Real-time Monitoring) – Based on the condition indicators
• Proactive Maintenance/Run-To-Failure at certain conditions

 

Pictographic view of FMEA/RCM Assessment flow:

 

 

I hope this blog could able to brief you all about the core capabilities of IAM (Intelligent Asset Management) Suite and its association with Industry 4.0

 

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Yours faithfully,

Pardhasaradhi Reddy.C