Asset management with IoT for enhanced efficiency

• Client profile: Global market-leading supplier in the development and manufacture of high-end cables with a €1.428,9 mil. total revenue in market prices (2017).
• Project: Comprehensive and efficient tool tracking solution.

As a high-end cable and cable solution producer, the client must handle operations all around the world. These operations usually translate in the shipping of different types of tools to the actual construction sites all around the world.

The company realised that closely monitoring the tools would enable preventive maintenance, thus extending the life of their assets and resulting in a decrease of time and operational costs. 

• Decrease the time spent tracking tools: With operations worldwide, keeping track of the assets was prone to human-error and took a lot of time and resources. 
• Replace the manual storage and classification of the tools in use: The company had designated administrators that were responsible for keeping track of all the tools’ parameters (type of tool, location, certificates, revisions, etc.). 
• Ensure a proactive response: Allow employees to have an overview of the required calibrations, tool replacement situations, and tools’ certifications. 
• Ensure enhanced mobility and accessibility: Enable the designated administrators to have a comprehensive image of the tools’ parameters no matter the location or the time.
• Diminish tool-related costs: Allow users to monitor costs and distribution that decreases the replacement and the shipping costs for the tools. 
• Improve safety and compliance: Have a clear overview of the tools’ validity.

• Swift
• Angular JS
• Microsoft Azure
• Spring by Pivotal

The platform made a significant contribution to the optimisation and digitisation of our client’s logistics processes. The business value lies essentially in the time savings and in the increased productivity. The company also saw the improvement of the overall services quality and in compliance. 

With this tracking solution, the entire tool check-in and check-out process is largely automated, and the current position of a tool is automatically reported back to the system. 

Now, the company’s users are enabled with fast access to information related to tools such as geo-location, warehouse situation, environment data, electrical and mechanical certificates, etc. 

The tool tracking platform allows an interactive detection of nearby tools, thus significantly shortening the time needed for locating a certain asset. The persons responsible can see accurate information regarding one or more tools in a matter of seconds no matter the location of the user. In addition, the costs can be better monitored and distributed as life-span of a tool or machine can be accurately tracked. 

The tool also improves the work safety, since all the electrical and mechanical test certificates are automatically checked for validity and a corresponding feedback is sent to the user.