This is a weeve solution to solve the challenges that come with machine data acquisition.
When it comes to acquisition of insightful data from the field, two great challenges are present:
First, the integration to the local IT infrastructure proves difficult and time consuming because of security restrictions and costly connections. Second, evaluating a machine’s condition might depend on different indicators (e.g. temperature vs current draw). Even when focusing on the same indicators, a slight variation in the evaluation algorithm calls for an easy way to update and deploy remotely.
Equipment manufacturers or vendors need an up to date view on the condition of their assets. Why? Usual reasons include the provision of after sales services and maintenance, leasing the equipment under a pay-per-use model or even being compliant with consumption/emission restrictions.
The complete solution includes data from the machine itself as well as from sensors that are specific to the setup and environment in which the machine is installed. Using own LTE connectivity, the data have clear ownership while interference with the internal network is unnecessary.
The manufacturer knows that scheduled maintenance should occur after 10000 hrs of operation. They decide to work smart on this one. Through weeve platform, they create a data service which reads the machine status from the controller, adds up the minutes that the machine is active, converts to hours and opens a ticket to the corresponding maintenance business system at 9000 hrs. Now it’s easy to schedule resources for the maintenance of the specific asset well in advance.
Due to a faulty component batch, the temperature of some assets is rising above normal, indicating that the component is indeed faulty and needs to be replaced. A new data service is designed: A retrofitted sensor providing temperature as input, a lightweight machine learning algorithm to decide what ‘not normal’ means (since different assets operate in different environments) and a push notification egress, which notifies the field technician if the anomaly remains for more than 24 hrs, so they can immediately attend to the problem.
weeve is a Berlin based software startup built in the German leading venture studio Next Big Thing. Our groundbreaking IoT data management platform provides the building blocks that enable companies to turn their machines or connected assets data into useful insight and business value!
Christos Zachiotis