Understanding enterprise asset management

Enterprise asset management (EAM) is a comprehensive approach to managing an organisation's physical assets throughout their lifecycle, from procurement and operation through to maintenance and eventual disposal.

Organisations typically face multiple challenges when managing assets:

• Diverse asset types with unique maintenance requirements
• Aging infrastructure requiring frequent and costly repairs
• Budget constraints demanding a careful balance between asset maintenance and replacement
• Strict regulatory compliance requirements

When done right, effective EAM has been proven to ensure optimal asset performance, significantly extend the lifespan of assets, and enhance productivity.

Key functions of enterprise asset management

Enterprise asset management helps organisations take better care of their assets, making them last longer and work better. At its core, it involves tracking assets from when they're bought until they're no longer needed, ensuring you always know their condition and location. This helps you make smarter decisions about when to repair or replace them.

Another important part is scheduling maintenance before problems occur, which can save you a lot of money by avoiding unexpected breakdowns. Good EAM practices also help you stay compliant with regulations, providing easy-to-access records and reports if you're ever audited.

Overall, EAM helps keep costs down by ensuring that assets are used wisely, and that money is not wasted on unnecessary repairs or replacements. It's all about ensuring that assets are reliable, safe, and cost-effective throughout their lifecycle.

What is ERP?

Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software is a centralised system that integrates and automates critical business functions together, including finance, procurement, human resources and payroll, supply chains, and much more. Rather than having these business functionals siloed, a good ERP solution allows you to see everything you need in one place.

Integrating asset management within an ERP system provides organisations with a centralised solution for asset management. ERP asset management involves using ERP software to unify asset-related processes with those of other business functions, making it particularly useful for larger companies, governments, and higher education providers (more on that later).

ERP vs standalone asset management systems: What’s the difference?

Standalone EAM systems have some overlap with ERP software. Essentially, they can do the same thing, but a standalone EAM system only provides the functionality to look after asset management.

While both ERP and standalone asset management systems play crucial roles in asset management, they serve distinct purposes and offer different scopes of functionality. Standalone asset management solutions primarily focus on managing the lifecycle and maintenance requirements of physical assets. These systems are highly specialised and provide targeted features specifically tailored to asset management needs.

An EAM system can technically be ERP software, since ERP is quite a broad term. But in contrast, ERP systems integrate asset management processes into a broader range of business functions such as finance, procurement, human resources, and operational management. This holistic approach is generally more efficient, as it enables organisations to gain a unified view across multiple departments.

Integrating asset management into an ERP system offers several distinct advantages, including:

• Scalability and flexibility: ERP systems adapt seamlessly to business growth and evolving asset management requirements.
• Cost-effectiveness and ROI: Integrating asset management into an ERP system significantly reduces costs, with research showing ERP solutions can lower Total Cost of Ownership by approximately 32%.
• Holistic integration: ERP ensures that asset management data integrates smoothly with other core business processes, enhancing overall operational efficiency and providing comprehensive visibility for better decision-making.

How ERP enhances asset management efficiency

As well as integration with other business processes, studies show about 78% of businesses experience increased productivity after implementing ERP, thanks to the following benefits:

• Real-time asset visibility
• Improved maintenance planning
• Enhanced regulatory compliance

Real-time asset visibility

ERP systems provide continuous, accurate data on asset conditions and performance. Over 65% of organisations reporting better real-time data use after implementing ERP, enabling rapid, informed decision-making and proactive asset management.

Improved maintenance planning

Automated workflows streamline maintenance scheduling, significantly reducing asset downtime through predictive analytics and automated reminders.

Enhanced regulatory compliance

ERP systems simplify compliance through automated data tracking and robust reporting tools, ensuring organisations remain audit-ready and adhere strictly to regulations.

Which industries benefit from ERP asset management?

Organisations across various sectors are using ERP software for asset management more and more, including:

• Manufacturing and production: Optimising plant and machinery performance to ensure maximum productivity.
• Construction and infrastructure: Managing diverse and geographically dispersed assets with varying lifecycle requirements.
• Healthcare and pharmaceuticals: Maintaining stringent compliance standards and reducing downtime of critical equipment.
• Energy and utilities: Proactively managing infrastructure to avoid service disruptions and extend asset life.

Local government, government, and education sectors have specifically benefited immensely from TechnologyOne’s integrated ERP solutions:

• Local councils can streamline asset management processes, significantly cutting down response times to infrastructure issues, improving community services, and achieving substantial cost savings.
• Government agencies gain enhanced transparency, regulatory compliance, and efficient management of public assets, enabling better service delivery and accountability.
• Educational institutions benefit through improved maintenance scheduling and facility management, ensuring safer, more reliable environments for students and staff.

Real-world examples of ERP asset management

Don’t just take our word for it. Below are several examples of real-world companies, local councils, educators, and state governments that have successfully used TechnologyOne’s Enterprise Asset Management product.

• Southern Downs Regional Council invested in TechnologyOne’s EAM to enhance community asset visibility and management, resulting in improved asset utilisation and more informed decision-making.
• Victorian TAFEs have utilised TechnologyOne's EAM to drive digital transformation across campuses, significantly enhancing asset maintenance efficiency and improving overall educational infrastructure
• Queensland’s BMD Group switched to TechnologyOne’s ERP asset management platform to efficiently manage a $2 billion infrastructure pipeline, unlocking optimal resource allocation and project oversight.
• Noosa Council significantly improved road safety by integrating AI-driven asset management solutions from TechnologyOne, reducing hazards and improving infrastructure quality.
• Tasmanian Irrigation adopted TechnologyOne’s EAM to digitally uplift the state's agricultural sector, ensuring efficient water asset management and bolstering productivity through accurate data insights.

"Our whole business revolves around the assets we own and manage, they are complex infrastructure projects enabling farmers to expand, diversify and value-add their businesses. The move to TechnologyOne Enterprise Asset Management gives us an integrated view of our whole business, which has helped us streamline operations and find great efficiencies."

James Hipwood

Chief Financial Officer

Tasmanian Irrigation

You can read more of our real-world customer stories here.

Choosing the right ERP for asset management

With a growing number of ERP solutions available, choosing the right one will be one of, if not THE most important decision your business can make. There’s a long list of benefits of choosing the right ERP solution, such as increased productivity, better decision-making, happier staff and, of course, long-term savings.

But good ERP software isn’t cheap, and there can be heavy costs to choosing the wrong one. There are several essential steps you can, and should take to ensure you choose the right ERP system:

1. Determine your business needs
2. Choose: SaaS vs on-premises ERP
3. Does it have upper-management support?
4. Does it have end-user (employee) support?
5. Is it scalable for future growth?
6. Does it integrate with your existing systems?
7. How much does it cost?

Each one of these steps is as important as the last, which is why we’ve written about them in greater detail in our article on how to choose the right ERP system for your business.