Asset management system for HF sensitive measurement devices

• US 20160025784A1
• Filed: 07/25/2014
• Published: 01/28/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 07/25/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Rohde & Schwarz GmbH & Company KG
• Original Assignee: Rohde & Schwarz GmbH & Company KG
• Inventors: Ripp, Harald, Mann, Hans-Joachim, Winkler, Michael
• Granted Patent: US 9,696,343 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G01R 1/04 Housings; Supporting members; Arrangements of terminals
• CPC Class Codes: G01R 1/18 Screening arrangements against electric or magnetic fields, e.g. against earth's field
• CPC Class Codes: G01R 31/31907 Modular tester, e.g. controlling and coordinating instruments in a bus based architecture
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/087 Inventory or stock management, e.g. order filling, procurement or balancing against orders
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 50/04 Manufacturing
• CPC Class Codes: Y02P 90/30 Computing systems specially adapted for manufacturing

Abstract

An asset management system comprising an asset management server connected to a plurality of distributed HF sensitive measurement devices each having at least one inseparable asset tag being located outside a high frequency shield which shields an internal circuitry of the measurement device from external high frequency signals and being configured to provide asset data of the respective measurement device to be processed by the asset management server.

Claims

1. A high frequency, HF, sensitive measurement device comprising a measurement circuitry with a surrounding high frequency shield adapted to shield the measurement circuitry from external high frequency interference signals,

wherein said measurement device comprises at least one inseparable asset tag located outside the high frequency shield,

said asset tag being configured to communicate with an external interrogator of an asset management system.

2. The measurement device according to claim 1, wherein the at least one asset tag is integrated in a housing of said measurement device and/or attached inseparable to the housing of said measurement device.

3. The measurement device according to claim 1, wherein the asset tag is connected to the internal measurement circuitry of the measurement device to derive or receive asset data of said measurement device.

4. The measurement device according to claim 1, wherein the at least one asset tag is an autonomous asset tag configured to communicate with the external interrogator of the asset management system independently from an operation state of said measurement device.

5. The measurement device according to claim 1, wherein the measurement device comprises at least one data interface for connecting the measurement device via a data network to a control server and/or an asset management server of a production facility.

6. The measurement device according to claim 5, wherein the asset management server is configured to perform an asset management of a plurality of distributed measurement devices on the basis of asset data received from asset tags of the distributed measurement devices.

7. The measurement device according to claim 1, wherein the at least one asset tag of the measurement device comprises asset data indicating a current state of the measurement circuitry of the respective measurement device.

8. The measurement device according to claim 7, wherein an asset management server of the asset management system is adapted to evaluate the current states of the measurement devices on the basis of the received asset data to identify measurement devices requiring calibration or recalibration of components within its measurement circuitry.

9. The measurement device according to claim 1, wherein the measurement device comprises an internal operation time measurement unit adapted to measure the operation time of the measurement device and to set a calibration request indication flag if the operation time of the measurement device exceeds a predetermined threshold value.

10. The measurement device according to claim 9, wherein the asset tag of the measurement device is adapted to transmit the calibration request indication flag to the interrogator of the asset management system which supplies the calibration request indication flag along with an identifier of the measurement device to an asset management server of the asset management system.

11. The measurement device according to claim 10, wherein the identified measurement device to be recalibrated is transported to a calibration apparatus configured to recalibrate the identified measurement device.

12. The measurement device according to claim 1, wherein the at least one asset tag of the measurement device comprises an active asset tag and/or a passive asset tag.

13. The measurement device according to claim 12, wherein the measurement device comprises a short range asset tag and/or a long range asset tag,

wherein the long range asset tag of the measurement device provides asset data evaluated to locate the measurement device in a facility and

wherein the short range asset tag of the measurement device provides asset data to indicate a current state of the measurement device.

14. The measurement device according to claim 13, wherein the short range asset tag comprises a near field communication, NFC, tag.

15. The measurement device according to claim 13, wherein the long range asset tag comprises a Bluetooth tag.

16. The measurement device according to claim 1, wherein the measurement device further comprises at least one hidden middle range antitheft tag.

17. The measurement device according to claim 1, wherein the ranges of the at least one asset tag of the measurement device are preconfigured or adjusted depending on the physical dimensions of the measurement device and/or the respective facility.

18. The measurement device according to claim 17, wherein the range of a short range asset tag is preconfigured or adjusted to:

R=½

Min(W, H, L),

wherein

W is the width of the housing of the measurement device,

H is the height of the housing of the measurement device, and

L is the length of the housing of the measurement device.

19. The measurement device according to claim 1, wherein the at least one asset tag comprises a write memory to which configuration data can be written by the interrogator of the asset management system.

20. The measurement device according to claim 1, wherein the at least one asset tag comprises a proximity detection unit configured to detect the presence of an interrogator of the asset management system in the vicinity of the asset tag and to push automatically asset data from the asset tag to said interrogator if the interrogator is within the range of the asset tag.

21. The measurement device according to claim 1, wherein the measurement circuitry of the measurement device comprises high frequency components sensitive to external high frequency signals shielded by the surrounding high frequency shield.

22. A mobile asset management interrogator switchable between at least two operation modes,

wherein the asset management interrogator is configured to read in a first operation mode first asset data from long range asset tags attached to distributed measurement devices and is configured to read in a second operation mode second asset data from short range asset tags attached to the distributed measurement devices.

23. A measurement device rack comprising stacked measurement devices each having a measurement circuitry with a surrounding high frequency shield to protect the measurement circuitry from external high frequency interference signals,

wherein each measurement device comprises at least one inseparable asset tag located outside its high frequency shield.

24. The measurement device rack according to claim 23,

wherein the measurement device rack comprises a long range asset tag to locate the measurement device rack in a facility and

wherein each measurement device stacked in the measurement device rack comprises a short range asset tag.

25. An asset management system comprising an asset management server connected to a plurality of distributed HF sensitive measurement devices each having at least one inseparable asset tag being located outside a high frequency shield which shields an internal circuitry of the measurement device from external high frequency interference signals and being configured to provide asset data of the respective measurement device to be processed by the asset management server.

26. The asset management system according to claim 25, wherein each HF sensitive measurement device comprises at least a short range asset tag and/or a long range asset tag read by an asset management interrogator switchable between at least two operation modes,

wherein the asset management interrogator is configured to read in a first operation mode first asset data from long range asset tags attached to distributed HF sensitive measurement devices and is configured to read in a second operation mode second asset data from short range asset tags attached to the distributed measurement devices.

27. A method for providing asset data of a plurality of distributed HF sensitive measurement devices comprising:

(a) reading asset data from at least one inseparable asset tag of each monitored HF sensitive measurement device, wherein said asset tag is located outside a high frequency shield protecting an internal measurement circuitry of the measurement device from external high frequency interference signals;

(b) processing the read asset data by an asset management server to perform asset management of the distributed HF sensitive measurement devices.

28. A computer program product comprising instructions to perform asset management of a plurality of distributed HF sensitive measurement devices by

reading asset data from at least one inseparable asset tag of each monitored measurement device, said asset tag being located outside a high frequency shield protecting an internal measurement circuitry of the measurement device from external high frequency interference signals, and

processing the read asset data to perform asset management of the distributed measurement devices.