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Plant maintenance technology architecture

  • US 7,406,431 B2
  • Filed: 03/14/2001
  • Issued: 07/29/2008
  • Est. Priority Date: 03/17/2000
  • Status: Expired due to Term
First Claim
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1. A computer-implemented architecture for providing maintenance services by performing a method of aligning maintenance policies to business objectives of a customer, comprising the steps of:

  • (a) building a facility maintenance repository of historical data including performing a collection of business and maintenance processes of a facility to produce a historical assessment of a potential customer'"'"'s facility, wherein the historical assessment identifies specific hardware equipment and software and site maintenance requirements and is related to technical services at the facility;

    (b) determining processes utilizing the specific hardware equipment and software identified in (a) above, and performing a criticality analysis that categorizes the processes as either critical or non-critical based on the impact a failed process has on the operation of the customer'"'"'s facility;

    (c) performing a component identification of specific components that constitute the equipment utilized in the critical processes identified above;

    (d) analyzing the failure modes of the components identified in (c) above and determining which analytical technique or combination of analytical techniques is necessary to predict a technical system or component failure;

    (e) proposing an outsourced technical and maintenance services package, wherein the outsourced technical and maintenance services package includes providing a presentation manual for presenting information on the maintenance services being proposed, said manual being based on the historical data of the customer'"'"'s facility and on historical data of comparable facilities of others and on predictions of technical system and component failure;

    wherein the outsourced maintenance package is based on providing maintenance support necessary for successful operation of the critical processes identified in (b) above(f) establishing agreement with the potential customer to provide maintenance according to the outsourced maintenance package of step (e) above;

    (g) providing maintenance at the customer'"'"'s facility according to the agreement of (f);

    (h) further providing 24 hours a day, 7 days a week remote support by utilizing regional facilities that are located in at least three geographic regions around the world such that the regional facilities are staffed during normal daytime business hours;

    wherein the remote support provides the following services to the customer facility;

    (1) providing on call support of expert advice;

    wherein the expert advice is provided by the regional facilities based on the information contained in a knowledge database;

    wherein the knowledge database utilizes historical information based on other, similar industrial facilities or components(2) providing remote condition monitoring of the components identified in (c) utilizing at least one of the analytical techniques identified in (d);

    wherein the remote condition monitoring is further enhanced utilizing the knowledge database;

    (i) benchmarking the customer facility'"'"'s key performance indicators against comparable other facilities to improve the performance of the maintenance provider against the benchmark.

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