Emerson launches expanded reliability management consulting service

Recent acquisition helps enlarge range of services combined with growing product line. Campaign aims at saving customers cost and improving production capacity.

By Emerson Process Management October 9, 2014

Emerson’s new global reliability management consulting offering aims at guiding leaders on how to manage maintenance costs, improve reliability, and increase profitability. Citing the huge costs of unplanned downtime, Emerson Process Management is expanding its package of services dedicated to improving production by reducing unplanned shutdowns caused by equipment failures. For customers in markets such oil and gas, chemicals, refining, and power where 24/7 operations are routine, studies show that individual plants can suffer 5% to 7% unplanned downtime losses due to poor maintenance practices. Emerson’s new global reliability management consulting offering aims at guiding leaders on how to manage maintenance costs, improve reliability, and increase profitability. It wants to elevate the reliability discussion to the boardrooms of its customers and show those companies that they can save millions in wasted expense and lost revenue.

“C-suite executives are seeing the need to better manage physical assets for improved profitability,” says Steve Sonnenberg, president of Emerson Process Management. “With the right strategy, the typical $1 billion plant can save $12 million or more annually in maintenance costs – not including the corresponding operational and production benefits from reduced downtime. Extend that across a corporation’s network of facilities and soon reliability becomes the number one strategic lever for a safer, more profitable enterprise.”

By reducing scheduled and unscheduled downtime, companies can reduce their maintenance spend by 50% or more, according to Solomon Associates, a leading benchmarking company in the process industries that tracks companies’ performance based on reliability and maintenance metrics. Optimized reliability practices – such as increased condition monitoring and analysis-based maintenance activities – drive down costs and also improve sales, quality, health and safety, and environmental compliance.  These are all key factors affecting operational risk and shareholder value.

Corbion, a global food and biochemical company with plants in many countries, implemented standardized best practices of reliability over several years and reduced its global maintenance expense by one third while simultaneously dramatically increasing availability. These actions enabled the company to capture millions of euros in increased profits and sustained increases in capacity and production.

To expand its portfolio of reliability-focused services, Emerson recently acquired Management Resources Group, Inc. (MRG), a management consulting firm with 28 years of experience improving reliability in industrial manufacturing. This strategic investment complements Emerson’s existing lifecycle services offering, as well as the company’s leadership in “pervasive sensing” which provides manufacturers greater sensor-based coverage of their plants and assets. Through its consultants, Emerson can advise global customers on enterprise-wide reliability management programs that connect the millions of data points collected in a plant, providing actionable information to trigger maintenance activities before equipment fails.              

“If a company is not a top-quartile performer, it is losing millions in revenue and spending millions of dollars on unnecessary maintenance costs,” says Robert DiStefano, MRG’s founder and former CEO. “Every dollar not spent on maintenance goes directly to the bottom line. Our approach helps companies reduce downtime and enhance safety and compliance, increasing the stature and reputation of a company and ultimately providing better value for shareholders.”

A recent Solomon RAM study found companies reach the top-performing quartile when they have less than 3% unplanned downtime and maintenance costs less than 2% of plant replacement value (PRV). For example, a $1 billion top-performing plant spends $12 to $20 million per year on maintenance expense. By contrast, poor performers spend two to four times more per year.

www.emersonprocess.com

– Edited by CFE Media, Control Engineering, Plant Engineering