What is EAM software?

Overseeing tools, employees and other assets is essential to ensure the smooth operation of your business and raise productivity. Enterprise asset management software — i.e., EAM software — can support you in this mission, offering multiple applications across various industries.

What is EAM?

EAM combines software, systems and services to maintain and supervise a company’s equipment and assets. Its chief purpose is to extend the quality and usage of these assets throughout their life cycle while reducing operating costs. It covers all stages, including asset capital planning, procurement, installation, performance, maintenance and disposal.

Why do we need EAM?

All organisations — regardless of size — possess assets. For large corporations, these assets constitute the thousands of puzzle pieces that make up the company. EAM helps monitor, evaluate and optimise these elements, which could be vehicles, materials or buildings. EAM provides numerous advantages:

• Information centralisation. Maintenance supervisors know the asset’s location, requirements, assigned personnel and the duration of work. Typically, the technology for the EAM strategy is integrated into a computerised maintenance management system, which automates these processes.
• Application consolidation. EAM software consolidates the management of virtually any asset within your company.
• Infrastructure and obsolescence management. Having more information to execute maintenance tasks and assess risks extends asset life cycles and boosts return on investment (ROI).
• Asset maximisation. Collecting data through Internet of Things (IoT) sensors and devices or analytical tools increases equipment availability and reliability.
• Safety improvements. Artificial intelligence (AI), analytics and IoT simplify the task of ensuring compliance with environmental and occupational health and safety requirements.
• Predictive maintenance. EAM software prevents problems before they happen, avoiding production downtime.
• Remote monitoring. An EAM system consolidates information from different departments and sources to provide more accurate alerts and decision-making support.

How do you implement EAM successfully?

There are several best practices for EAM strategies to maximise their effectiveness. However, they can be further enhanced with EAM software. Optimal asset management considers these aspects:

• Analysis. Obtain as much information as you can on operations to automate specific tasks.
• Maintenance. Correct asset management makes corrective maintenance — repairing breakdowns and conducting preventive inspections — a thing of the past. Instead, you can perform predictive maintenance when the data indicate anomalies.
• Planning. With orders and plans represented visually through diagrams, it becomes easier to prioritise certain tasks.
• Records. Collect data relating to jobs, from initial request to completion.
• Safety. Documenting incidents lets you analyse them and implement corrective measures.
• Traceability. Meter or barcode reading and RFID solutions are other ways you can gather information.
• Supply chain visibility. Incorporating IoT technology helps integrate EAM software with supply chain management systems.

Sectors like intralogistics employ warehouse management systems (WMSs) with specific functions for these tasks. This software provides detailed information on goods inflows/outflows and order status. Moreover, it maintains product traceability across the entire journey.

EAM applications in industry

EAM software can benefit multiple sectors in a variety of ways:

• Energy and utilities. When distributing water, gas and electricity, assets such as pipelines and power lines are used. Managing personnel scheduling and remote equipment information is complex.
• Manufacturing. Asset management is highly valuable in diverse sectors such as automotive, aerospace, defense, electronics and industrial and consumer product manufacturing.
• Mining and petrochemistry. In these fields, it’s vital to have detailed information on asset status and workflows and to comply strictly with health and safety regulations.
• Healthcare. EAM software enables professionals to track, locate and prepare critical assets, ensure the correct condition of facilities and generate reports.
• Transport. Comprehensive information about assets and their inventory facilitates effective logistics operations. This extends to driver records, spare parts, delivery schedules, fuel availability and more.

What is EAM software?

EAM software tracks and analyses the costs and performance of a company’s assets throughout their life cycle. It provides a centralised view of all equipment, encompassing repair histories, audits and purchase orders. This consolidation helps each part of the business to be in sync with the rest.

Through remote monitoring driven by AI in logistics and advanced tracking, managers can make better decisions.

How does EAM software work?

Although these programs used to be installed on-premise, technology allows for them to be cloud-based. This is extremely useful for linking an EAM with other management systems, such as a WMS. These are the key steps to follow in EAM:

1. Migrate assets to the cloud. Having a centralised data repository makes it possible to use analytics and retrieve strategic information.
2. Employ data to optimise productivity. Machine learning, digital twins and predictive analytics enable you to carry out predictive maintenance, thus maximising asset availability.
3. Schedule inspections proactively. Detect, report and resolve incidents quickly, prioritising the most critical to minimise inactivity.
4. Manage assets and fieldwork. Track work orders from anywhere.

Are you looking to gain full control over your warehouse operations? It’s best to empower yourself with data on your logistics operations to raise your productivity. So, be sure to contact us. At Mecalux, we’re experts in intralogistics solutions. Our Easy WMS software — developed by a team of more than 400 engineers — reduces logistics costs and errors while enhancing the operation of production and distribution centres.