Process industries lose 20 bln

According to a recent survey carried out jointly by plant services.com and ARC advisory group global process industries lose around $20 billion annually due to unscheduled downtime.

The survey found that the goal for almost 90% of all companies using predictive maintenance was to increase uptime. In addition, well over 50% of all companies wanted to use predictive maintenance techniques and processes as a method of reducing maintenance and overall operational costs.

The survey concluded with a number of recommendations, of which perhaps the most interesting was that predictive maintenance solutions should ideally be integrated with plant-wide control systems and that the operation and outcomes of such systems should be linked to financial incentives for plant operators.

It is a well-known fact that incentivising employees can improve output and motivation. Such techniques have traditionally been used in sales and production roles, perhaps less so in maintenance roles. However, incentivising maintenance staff, linking their bonus or reward to for example improvements in uptime or reductions in maintenance and operating cost potentially offers plant managers a low-cost and efficient method of improving business performance at a time of challenging economic conditions.

Find the survey here