Just as homeowners are more likely to renovate their current homes rather than purchase a new one when the economy is soft, so too are many manufacturers opting to maintain and repair their existing equipment rather than making substantial capital investments in new systems. According to Ralph Rio, research director at analyst firm ARC Advisory Group, there’s been strong growth in the adoption and usage of maintenance management systems, and that growth has been propelled by four key factors: uptime, cost control, asset longevity and safety.
| Enterprise Asset Management in 25 Words or Less Enterprise asset management (EAM) is the management of the assets of an enterprise across departments, facilities, business units and geographical locations. Source: Techopedia.com |
After a few down years due to the recession, the market for so-called enterprise asset management (EAM) solutions has rebounded, reaching $2.2 billion in 2011. Rio sees this market continuing to expand over the next several years, reaching $3 billion by 2015. EAM solutions typically include several areas of functionality required by maintenance organizations, he notes, including: asset information management, work order management, MRO materials management, labor management and service contract management. But that’s just for starters. Some companies, for instance, are adapting this maintenance-centric technology to reduce their carbon footprints as they get a better handle on their energy usage.
