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Month: October 2021

ISO 5500X – Do you have an Asset Management Strategy?

Posted on by Matt Sickler

Companies are constantly challenged by how to adapt their asset management practices to the volatility, uncertainty, change and ambiguity in today’s business environment.

To address these challenges, the International Standards Organization (ISO) developed the ISO 5500X Series of standards for companies to perform effective and efficient asset management practices.

The ISO’s 5500X Series (55000, 55001, 55002) helps organizations address their asset management challenges by setting best practices for companies to follow, standardize their processes and deliver increased value to their customers, investors and stakeholders.

In this article, we’ll share the role that the ISO 5500X standards play in taking asset management from a business task to a strategy. 

Before going into depth on ISO 55000, it is important to understand what we mean by assets and their management.

ISO 55000 defines assets as any “item, thing or entity that has potential or actual value to an organization”. In other words, anything in your company that creates or adds value, from your physical assets (such as PPE) to your IP, to your employees and stakeholders.

Asset management, refers to the use of industry tools (e.g. software / applications/ platforms) to measure and assess their performance using key performance indicators(KPIs). This practice also includes analyzing and mitigating the business risks associated with the use of the assets.

In short, proper asset management practices require protecting everything that adds value to your company. This, in turn, is essential to ensuring the streamlined performance of your company’s assets and resources, as well as for reducing costs and unnecessary efforts.

As mentioned above, ISO 5500X is a series of international standards that present general concepts and specify global principles for asset management. It’s often seen as a ‘manual’ that uniforms asset management parameters and practices anywhere in the world.

For example, if your company has operations (e.g. production plants, manufacturing) in Germany, Brazil, US and India, becoming ISO 5000X-certified will help standardize your asset management practices in each location. This standardization delivers different business benefits such as the ones we discuss further in this post.

ISO 5500X was created with the aim of offering companies new options for managing operating costs by adopting an efficient and standardized asset management strategy.

In 2004, the British Standards Institution (BSI) created the PAS 55 standard (Publicly Available Specification), a guide to best practices in the management of assets and possessions of various kinds.

PAS 55 guided industries in several “key points”, considered good practices in asset management. These key points referred to improvements in areas such as energy, electricity, water, roads, air and land transport, manufacturing, natural resources, and many others.

After 10 years of different companies adopting and implementing PAS 55, the ISO acknowledged the need for excellence in asset management practices and created the ISO 55000 series to replace PAS 55.

In 2014, the ISO Project Committee finally launched ISO 55000, which has become widespread worldwide and is now considered the main guide for industries and companies that want to implement and optimize their asset management practices.

The ISO 5500X series includes three standards for Asset Management:

  • ISO 55000:2014 – Overview, principles and terminology.
  • ISO 55001: 2014 – Asset Management Systems (AMS) requirements
  • ISO 55002:2018 – Management Systems – Guidelines on the application of ISO 55001 

In addition to the economic and productivity benefits described above, adhering to ISO 5500X standards includes a series of benefits. Implementing ISO standards unifies all process methods, metrics and evaluation criteria.

ISO certification requires transparency for all stages of production and manufacturing processes. This transparency is very beneficial when it comes to proving compliance with relevant rules, requirements and regulations.

Adhering to ISO standards is an important step towards improving the quality of the goods and services delivered. ISO-level quality generate sustainable growth which, in turn, increases your industrial processes’ productivity.

ISO Standard Certification is a very rigorous process. We’ve identified 7 steps so you can prepare your company to apply for certification:

 

Objectives
Understand your company’s operating principles to align management and business objectives relevant to certification.

 

Strategy
Define your asset management strategy based on your business objectives. This will allow you to define goals for asset productivity, sustainability, life cycle, compliance and cost rationalization.

Documentation
Document all your activities from maintenance plans and inspections to repairs.

 

Leadership
Appoint a professional responsible for supervising the development, implementation, operation and continuous improvement of the asset management system.

 

Support
Identify the resources and people needed for the application process. Promote employee commitment and collaboration between different sectors of the company towards the common goal of certification.

 

Assessment
Evaluate implementation, control processes, monitor risks and support change management. Identify financial metrics for asset management performance and conduct regular checkpoints and audits.

 

Improvement
Identify process weaknesses and implement continuous improvement practices.

  

In short, ISO certification is a process that requires careful planning, managing stakeholder expectations and commitment from all parties involved.

Once the certification is achieved, adherence to ISO 5500X asset management standards will positively impact the entire corporate culture as well as how the company is seen by customers, stakeholders and the global corporate environment. Although it is a long and complicated process, the outcome is a strategic positive transformation that leads to improved business results. 

Sigga ‘s 20+ years’ experience in asset management and industrial maintenance solutions can guide you and your company through the process in an efficient and simple manner.

Our solutions allow you to optimize the execution of maintenance routines, eliminating unproductive tasks, excessive unnecessary shifts, as well as reducing paper usage to zero.

 

Using Sigga’s EAM Product Suite across your entire process towards ISO 5000X certification greatly facilitates executing your asset management strategy objectives as well as reaching your asset performance and productivity goals.

Enable your company’s digital transformation. Learn more about Sigga’s Solutions portfolio.

Do You Have an ISO 55000 Asset Management Plan?

Posted on by Matt Sickler

Companies are constantly challenged by how to adapt their asset management standards practices to the volatility, uncertainty, change and ambiguity in today’s business environment.

To address these challenges, the International Standards Organization (ISO) developed the ISO 55000 series(55000, 55001, and 55002) of international standards covering the management of assets of any kind.TheISO 55000 series describes what a company should do to maximize the value of its assets on a sustainable basis.

In this article, we’ll share the role that the ISO 55000 asset management standards play in formulating a best-in-class asset management plan for industrial maintenance asset-intensive companies that use SAP EAM.

Why is having an overall ISO 55000 asset management plan important?

 

“The most important benefit of asset management is that it provides a structured framework for investment planning that delivers the most cost-effective solutions for delivering acceptable levels of service over the entire asset life-cycle at minimal risk.”

– Definitions and Benefits of Asset Management

 

Proper asset management practices require protecting the assets that provide value to your company.ISO 55000 defines assets as any “item, thing or entity that has potential or actual value to an organization”. Assets include material assets such as machinery, equipment,furniture and vehicles, as well as intangible assets like patents, licenses and intellectual property.

An ISO 55000 asset management plan outlines how a company obtains value from its assets by optimizing performance, risks, and costs across the asset lifecycle. The plan defines the activities needed to classify, analyze, control, and measure the effectiveness of asset maintenance strategies. ISO 55000 combines organizational goals and structure with the process, data, technology, and auditing tools to maintain effective operations.

A comprehensive IS0 55000 asset management plan allows companies to make incremental improvements to their asset management strategies.As a result, companies improve performance, enhance customer satisfaction, save money and eliminate unnecessary efforts, while delivering increased value to their customers, investors and stakeholders.

 

Advantages of Applying ISO 55000 Standards to Enterprise Asset Management (EAM)

While an asset management plan can improve many areas of a business, EAM can particularly benefit by applying the principles of the ISO 55000 standards. EAM involves the management and maintenance of a company’s physical assets, from production equipment to power lines during the complete lifecycle of those assets. The failure to appropriately manage and maintain these assets can cause poor equipment performance, unplanned downtime, unnecessary work, and a shortage of maintenance parts and resources.

 

Getting Started: Data Capture and Data Quality are Key

 The easiest way to get started with building an ISO 55000 asset management plan, especially for EAM, is to gather all existing preventive maintenance plans, asset records, and previous analyses of failures.Data capture and dataintegrityarekeyto buildingand continually improvingan Asset Management Plan.The greater the amount of information collected about equipment performance and activities, the more useful the data will ultimately be.

YourSAP EAMsoftwareis an important resource for this endeavor if the data is structured well for analysis.AMobile EAM software solution can supply the ongoing structuring of data by capturing important details such as failure types, repair task time estimates and meter readings.

While these data inputs are extremely valuable, the raw data itself does not tell you how to respond, what procedure to follow, and who is responsible. However, creating an ISO 50000 management plan based on this data will provide the strategic direction needed to react to notifications and perform repairs efficiently.

 

Building the Asset Management Plan

TheseISO 55000 series of standard shareall highly relevant forEAM andtogether create the Asset Management Plan: 

While the ISO 55000 asset management plan series may have some differences depending on the type of company and assets, the following sections are normally included.

  • Plan Overview – Defines the assets in the plan, how the performance of these assets relates to your company’s objectives, the stakeholders involved with the plan, and how the plan relates to other company plans or standard practices.
  • Levels of Service – Describes how the assets should be performing and to what condition. Details on both current and targeted levels of service is necessary to identify gaps to be addressed in other sections of the asset management plan.
  • Future Demand – Provides details of forecasted growth and asset utilization, including demand drivers, impact of demand changes on assets, as well as contingency and investments needed to meet the demand forecast.
  • Asset Lifecycle Management – Summarizes how assets will be managed and operated at the service level outlined, while optimizing risk and costs. This is the most important part of the plan and includes the following subsections:
  • Background Information – Provides basic asset information including age, size, capacity, performance, current condition, current value and asset history.
  • Risk Management Plan – Identifies and evaluates risks based on consequences, probability and detectability to determine the impact to service levels, as well as define mitigations.
  • Operating Plan – Outlines operating strategies and methods used to meet service levels, prioritization of operating tasks and planned operating costs forecasts.
  • Equipment Maintenance Plan – Defines maintenance strategies and methods to meet service levels, prioritization of maintenance tasks, and maintenance cost forecasts.
  • Recapitalization Plan – Outlines expenditures that do not increase the asset’s capacity but restore or renew an existing asset to its original condition.
  • Capital Plan – Describes investments that create new assets or upgrade or improve an existing asset beyond its original capacity.
  • Disposal Plan– Identifies how outdated assets will be disposed of, including timing and impact on cash flow.
  • Financial Summary – Includes a recap of the financial activities resulting from the activities in the previous section, including a cash flow forecast.
  • Continuous Improvement – Details current and future asset management practices, how the plan will be monitored, and improvement recommendations and plans.

Tracking Progress to Goals

 

Creating an ISO 55000 asset management plan can seem overwhelming, but the business improvements that result from such a plan make it worth the effort. Tracking progress toward meeting goals outlined in the asset management plan can provide a sense of how well the plan is working.Key metrics to keep an eye on include:

  • Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF) – Measured in hours, MTBF reflects the average time an asset is functioning properly in between breakage or failure events. The higher the MTBF, typically the less downtime.
  • Mean Time to Repair (MTTR) – The MTTR metric reflects the average time it takes to troubleshoot and repair a failed piece of equipment. MTTR effectively measures both the effectiveness of your maintenance operations and a machine’s ability to be repaired or maintained.
  • Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE) – This metric focuses on the piece of equipment’s overall functionality and reliability, and thus its impact on downtime. The OEE calculation factors in machine availability, performance, and quality. In a perfect world, your OEE would be 100%.

Maintaining the Asset Management Plan

 

Creating an ISO 55000 asset management plan is not a one time activity, but rather a cycle of continuous improvement. An asset management plan should evolve over time. Capability gaps and opportunities for improvement will become apparent during the development of the plan. These improvement opportunities should be tackled on a regular basis and progress updated in the plan.

 

Moving from preventive maintenance approach to aReliabilityCenteredMaintenance (RCM) approach is one way you can take action on your company’s asset management plan. Preventative maintenance is intended to prevent major failures by scheduling maintenance of assets at regular intervals. In comparison, RCM is focused on keeping machinery and assets up and running at maximum capacity while minimizing maintenance costs.

 

With RCM, the conditions that could result in downtime are identified for each asset and prioritized from a maintenance cost standpoint. Then you determine what specific actions provide the best return on maintenance spend to prevent possible failures from occurring. This information can then be fed back into the asset management plan as part of the continuous improvement loop.

 

ISO 55000 Certification

 

The process for ISO 55000 certification is a rigorous one. Whether your company chooses to seek formal certification is a decision that every business must make.Regardless, your company will still benefit from aligning your asset management practices with the requirements of the ISO 55000 series.

An asset management plan that aligns with ISO 55000 asset management standards will optimize the return on investment for your enterprise assets, reduce risk and improve performance.The development of the plan sets the path for managing maintenance operations, drive continual improvement, and achieve near-term and future success.

 

How Sigga Can Help

Here at Sigga, we have been helping asset-intensive industries with SAPIM drive digital transformation and mobile initiatives in industrial maintenance for 20 years. OurSAPCertifiedEAM software improves the capture, structure, and quality of the data needed to build an asset management plan.The solutions are designed to then support the implementation and on-going measurements needed for continual improvement.

OurMobile EAM application digitizes the entire maintenance process connecting users across your business real-time. Mobile EAM helps your technicians accurately capture the data you’ll need for your asset management plan, allowing you to create custom, mandatory inputs to capture and structure the data you need on your critical assets.

 

Our integrated Planning & Scheduling Desktop software automates many scheduling routines withSAP EAM such as checking capacities, assigning resources, and prioritizing work orders. The software provides an easy interface to SAP data for creating and monitoring ofAsset Management Plans.

 

Our Mobile Warehouse & Inventory solution digitalizes the workflow of stockroom personnel, from inbound to outbound transactions, with an intuitive user interface.

 

With our TEAM products for SAP, your company can better collect the data needed to construct and manage your enterprise assets toan asset management plan. Let us help you achieve asset management plan objectives to reach your asset performance and productivity goals. 

20 Years of Simplifying EAM Workflows

Posted on by Matt Sickler

Only a handful of companies have been in the business of supporting Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) for a full two decades. And even fewer have experience providing mobile EAM solutions for nearly that long.

That’s why here at Sigga, we are proud to be celebrating 20 years of partnering with global enterprise SAP customers to accelerate and achieve their EAM digital transformation initiatives. Over the past two decades, we’ve provided services and innovative software applications that optimize maintenance workflows, streamline processes and generate real-time data to enhance productivity.

Our longevity is due to the successes of our loyal customers, many of which have been with us from the beginning. Here’s our story.

Sigga History

The Early Foundations

Our founder and CEO, Warley Borges, is no stranger to overcoming challenges and hard work. Growing up in the interior of Brazil, Warley had to work hard to make his dreams come true.

Warley initially went to work as a maintenance technician and quickly moved into management. While working full time, he opened his first business of building and selling computers. When speaking to potential investors in 2019, he called, “At that time,I had to work all day as a manager, attend engineering university at night and work on building computers with the remainder of my time.”

With several years of industrial maintenance experience under his belt, Warley sold his computer company to take a position at a Professional Services firm supporting ERP implementations. It was during this time thatWarley first met Romeu Sciotta, our current Executive Vice President, who was also building his career in Professional Services consulting.

Warley Noticed that there was an opportunity in the markettoprovide an even greater level of service to customers in the EAM space.So, it wasn’t long before the entrepreneurial spirit hitWarleyagain and, in 2001, he opened his own Professional Services Firm– Sigga. (It’s interesting to note that in Portuguese, SIGGA stands for Innovative Solutions to Guarantee Asset Management.) Romeu joined Warley at Sigga, establishing the leadership and foundation for our company.

Warley’sfirstbusiness planentailed having17 consultants working with companies to implement Maximo,Oracle,and SAP.In only 4 years,Warleyand RomeugrewSiggato more than 70 consultants and the company became the mostwell-knownEAM professional services company in South America.

From Professional Services to EAM Software

In working with SAP EAM clients,Warleyand Romeusaw the opportunity to vastly improve how maintenance teams use the powerful program. With this insight, they transitioned from a professional services company to being a provider of mobile apps and EAM software solutions to provide a more intuitive and productive user experience with SAP.

In 2002, they launched their first Mobile EAM app. Overtime,they drove continued continual innovations and support for the evolutions of mobile technologies.As a result, our first Mobile EAM customer, a leading manufacturer and supplier of cement, remains a global client of Sigga today.

Keeping Up With 20-Years of ERP Evolutions

From our early history of helping customers install ERP systems to providing solutions that vastly improve the interface and use of SAP, we have been dedicated to helping customers get the most out of theirEAMsystems.In 2005, Warley expanded our investment in R&D and hired Gustavo Comanduci, our current CTO, to join the company to lead the product innovation roadmap.

As a result, we have stayed on the cutting edge of developing and supporting mobile apps and software solutions that improve the use of each generation of SAP technologies. We were the first SAP partner to have a product running on the Sybase Unwired Platform. We were also the first partner to perform an SAP Customer Qualification Process.

With our deep industry experience, we developed a proprietary SAP-certified software integration technology for enterprise-scale installations to deliver higher performance for high volumes of users and transactions. We are one of a very few companies that have successfully addressed thischallenge.Due to this work,we became a benchmark SAP ICC partner for integrating solutions to SAP.

Our commitment to SAPcan be seen in our long history ofSAP qualifications including our SAP-certified EAM solutions,and sustaining our SAP Silver Partner Status for over 15-years.

 Rapid Global Expansion

We have a long history of working with asset-intensive, large, and global corporations with locations around the world. To serve our customers’ local operations, we have been continually expanding our talent around the globe including sales and professional services to provide deployment and on-going support.In the past few years, we officially opened offices in North America, Europe, and Asia Pacific, and then in 2019, moved the company headquarters to Houston, Texas.

A few examples of our global clients include oil and gas supplier, Petrobras consumer goods manufacturer, Unilever agri-business, BP Bunge beverage manufacturer Anheuser-Busch (Ambev) and metals and mining company, Glencore.

Prepared for the Next 20-Years

In 2020, we went into partnership with Gemspring Capital to bring additional support to our rapid growth trajectory. Gemspring chose to invest in Sigga due to our unique, competitive offerings and significant growth potential according to Aron Grossman, Managing Director at Gemspring. “Sigga’s world-class suite of EAM software products drives significant ROI for customers. The value and efficiency gain the software provides is of significant importance in today’s highly competitive market given the need for enterprises to drive higher plant efficiency despite shortages of skilled maintenance workers. We are delighted to partner with Warley and the entire Sigga team to build on their successes to date and accelerate the company’s momentum.”

Gemspring takes a hands-on approach to help drive growth, market leadership, operational excellence, and strategic value for their partner companies. Their expertise, resources, and capital will help us to accelerate our reach of service and support for our global clients.

Our Experience is Your Guarantee of Success

Today, Sigga is a US company, who’s mission continues to be focused on helping companies accelerate their digital transformation of Enterprise Asset Management.Our Mobile EAM app is a globally recognized solution to improve the work of maintenance teams and our talented people are constantly bringing new innovations to help our SAP customers achieve new levels of productivity and profitability.

With our 20 years of experience in transforming maintenance operations in enterprise asset-intensive industries,our customer-centric culture,and a high level of integrity,you can expect fast results.We have the knowledge and expertise to take you from initial engagement through deployment and supporting on-going use of our solutions to simplify how your organization works with SAP. You can count on us your success is our guarantee.

The Unsung Heroes: Maintenance Planners & Schedulers

Posted on by Matt Sickler

Effective maintenance planning and schedulingare critical components of a successful maintenance organization.The maintenance planning and maintenance scheduling functions serve as thelogistical glue that enables maintenance to build professional working relationships with all other corporate departments and facilitate the shift from a reactive to a proactive environment.

Despite its importance, thecontributions of maintenance planners and schedulers are often overlooked in the hustle and bustle of modern maintenance organizations. By recognizing the valuable roles that these individuals play and empowering them with the right tools and support, organizations can transform their maintenance processes.

> Continue reading “The Unsung Heroes: Maintenance Planners & Schedulers”

5 Tactics to Turnaround a Reactive Maintenance Culture

Posted on by Matt Sickler

The notifications keep rolling in and yourplant maintenance team is stretched thin to keep production in business.You know you need to get ahead of the madness, but thebreakdowns and ad hoc requestskeep taking precedence and the backlog is ever-growing. If you can relate to this situation, then it’stime to tackle some strategies to turn the situation around.In this article,we’ll cover thecauses of areactive maintenance culture andoutline several effectiveSAPplant maintenance strategies toget started on the path to reliability.

Continue reading “5 Tactics to Turnaround a Reactive Maintenance Culture”