< Previous POWER MANAGEMENT www.fm-middleeast.com40 December 2020 Industry 4.0 and Effi ciency – During a Crisis, one should look to digital power management and services By Waseem Taqqali, Vice President Field Services, Schneider Electric Gulf POWER MANAGEMENT DURING CRISISPOWER MANAGEMENT www.fm-middleeast.comDecember 2020 41 The manufacturing sector has been faced with challenges that have never been seen before. The pandemic has created a lingering global economic impact. From food and beverage, to packaged goods, pharmaceuticals, and oil and gas, most industries have had to manage through an extremely difficult time. As restaurants and hotels were forced to close their doors, demand for those sectors fell. In cases where demand has been maintained or even increased – such as for medical products or consumer goods due to increased eCommerce spending – supply chains have often been overwhelmed. In response to public health needs, some plants retooled to produce health and safety related products. As pandemic cases decrease in some regions, restrictions have been relaxed and facilities are reopening under strict health protocols. With consumer and business product demand normalising, manufacturing and processing plants are restarting or ramping up. Now the challenge is determining how to get going quickly and adapt to demand. THE NEW FACTORY REALITY Many organisations are contending with limited capacity to host employees on premise, meaning that some will have to work offsite. Others have lost experienced facility management or engineering staff through retirement or downsising. The reality is that factories may be forced to start or ramp up operations with part-time employees. These factors have resulted in fewer people with less expertise having to maintain facilities, sometimes remotely, while having an equal or greater scope of responsibility. The double hit of needing to survive a recession and standing up to continued (or even increased) competition means manufacturers need to sharpen focus on improving operational efficiency, sustainability, and resilience – while keeping their people safe. Because energy is the lifeblood of any factory, electrical power management is fundamental to achieving these goals while serving your customers and protecting your profits. DIGITISED, SIMPLIFIED POWER MANAGEMENT Digitalisation isn’t new to manufacturers; many have been implementing technology in their factories for years. Automation is helping to drive efficiency, reliability, and safety for machines and people. Power infrastructures can also modernised, with a return on investment that pays back in the space of a couple of years. Digitised electrical networks can leverage intelligent, IoT- enabled connected devices to deliver visibility and insights into power usage and infrastructure efficiency. These insights make it simpler for facility teams to protect people and assets, keep operations running, and save time and money. Here are a few examples: • Optimise reliability to achieve POWER MANAGEMENT www.fm-middleeast.com42 December 2020 Waseem Taqqali, Vice President Field Services, Schneider Electric Gulf. THE PANDEMIC HAS SHONE A LIGHT ON HOW IMPACTFUL DIGITISING OUR FACTORIES CAN BE. THE TECHNOLOGY MAY SEEM DAUNTING AT FIRST, BUT THE RIGHT APPROACH CAN ENSURE THAT OUR FACTORIES ARE MORE PRODUCTIVE AND EFFICIENT, MORE SUSTAINABLE, AND SAFER FOR PEOPLE TO WORK IN. greater uptime. Receive mobile alarm notifications of abnormal conditions, then use power forensics to isolate causes and recover from outages quickly. Simplify testing and reporting for backup power systems. • Optimise power quality to protect valuable electric and IT assets. Monitor 24/7 power quality of power network and get recommendations on what need to be done in case of abnormal power quality incidents. Comply with standards and protect sensitive equipment. • Optimise safety. Remotely monitor and operate breakers to minimise exposure to arc-flash risk and avoid safety hazards. • Optimise equipment performance and maintenance. Monitor equipment performance to support proactive maintenance to save costs, avoid failures, and extend lifespan. Track system capacity to avoid overloads and failures and reveal unused capacity to help avoid unnecessary upgrades or overbuilding. • Optimise energy and water consumption and costs. Correlate manufacturing processes to energy and water usage (e.g. energy consumed during process idling, process starved of parts, etc.). Compare and benchmark energy efficiency across buildings, plants, process lines, or loads, then identify opportunities to improve and validate savings. Allocate costs to departments or processes. Apply sub-metering to understand energy and water consumption by application type. Identify billing errors. Track energy performance indicators (EnPI) per ISO50006 and comply with energy efficiency and green building standards. We’ve learned how effective this is through our work with customers. We recently transformed one of the UAE’s fastest growing dairy farms into a technology-enabled operation that has cut power usage and downtime whilst also increasing production. The dairy farm’s operations have been digitised through a combination of software and hardware. The software platform provides the facility team with vital data and analytics for production processes, allowing them to improve output, as well as the ability to track and trace produce. Using an Internet-of-Things approach and connecting all the plant’s equipment has increased equipment efficiency and reduced downtime. The result is a smart manufacturing model, and one of the most productive dairy plants in the UAE. INDUSTRY 4.0 - APPROACHING MANUFACTURING DIFFERENTLY Over the past decade there’s been a debate about the Fourth Industrial Revolution and how we can best use new technologies to improve our manufacturing processes. The pandemic has shone a light on how impactful digitising our factories can be. The technology may seem daunting at first, but the right approach can ensure that our factories are more productive and efficient, more sustainable, and safer for people to work in. In every crisis there’s an opportunity, and for manufacturers looking for that silver lining in 2020 my advice is look to digitise your operations. Let’s approach manufacturing differently, and let’s make use of technologies such as Artificial Intelligence, 5G, and Augmented Reality to make this country and region a smart manufacturing hub. Wednesday 9th December JW Marriott Marquis Dubai, UAE LAST CHANCE TO BOOK YOUR SEATS! The Construction Week Awards are back for the 16th year. For further information, visit ConstructionWeekOnline.com/Awards #CWAWARDS For sponsorship enquiries: Saraswati Agarwal Group Commercial Manager T: +971 4 444 3352 E: saraswati.agarwal@itp.com For sponsorship enquiries: Moutaz Gadelhak Senior Sales Manager T: +971 4 444 3177 E: moutaz.gadelhak@itp.com For event enquiries: Daniel Fewtrell Director of Awards T: +971 4 444 3684 E: daniel.fewtrell@itp.com SILVER SPONSORS CATEGORY SPONSOR GOLD SPONSORS EDUCATION PARTNERSOCIAL MEDIA PARTNER PLATINUM SPONSORSwww.fm-middleeast.com44 December 2020 SPONSORS FM VIRTUAL CONFERENCE 2020 REPORT Facilities Management Middle East held its first ever virtual conference on 26 October 2020. Named as the Facilities Man- agement Virtual Conference 2020, the event debated on the use of technology in the FM world. The key topic of discussion at the virtual event was ‘Technology in FM’, which had expert panellists debat- ing on the inherent push driven by the ongoing pandemic in adopting technology for the management and maintenance of the built environment. The sponsors for the event were bfm, Ejadah and ServeU. The moderator for the event was Sara Momtaz, who has held senior execu- tive positions with Khidmah (subsidiary of Aldar), QBG Facilities Management Group, Abu Dhabi National Hotels Com- pass (a joint venture Abu Dhabi National Hotels & Compass Group), Damac Hold- ing and the Al Fara’a Group. At the first panel discussion, Momtaz posed the question on whether there has been an immediate need to adopt technol- ogy such as IoT and AI in this region because of the ongoing pandemic. One of the panellists, Gary Reader, the general manager of ServeU, said that several firm are already working with in- telligence solutions such CAFM systems, BMS, and energy management systems. However, the pandemic has accelerated the use of technology. He said: “The pan- demic has absolutely changed everything. The more the automation, the less will be the use of manpower. The pandemic has definitely accelerated everything that was being was being done.” Abdulla Al Wahedi, who is a facilities management expert in the region, agreed with Reader stating that in the current situation technology has supported con- nectivity and enabled communication. He said: “Technology has helped different companies to manage such an emergency and has provided the services needed without any interruptions.” Al Wahedi has over two decades of ex- perience in facilities management holding a number of high-profile roles including his last role as CEO of Khidmah. Mohannad F Almadhi, the managing director of Musanadah FM in Al Khobar, Saudi, added that the market in is still developing in FM. He said: “In order to jump into technology, we must have a mature market in terms of knowledge and operation. The growth of the FM market has been significant in adapt- ing to the concept of FM in transferring from operation maintenance into facility management. Although technology adop- tion is still taking time in this region, the government [in Saudi, for example] has pushed for more workshops in pro-gov- ernment and semi-government entities during the past two to three years. Smart buildings and systems are already there. Even the people who are learning are out there. But in terms of executing it on the ground, it is still taking some time. Everyone in the GCC region knows that technology in FM is beneficial, only the implementation is taking a bit longer than anticipated.” Momtaz moved on to her second panel discussion, which focused on the rise of robots in the FM industry, where she was joined by Andrea Deutschbein, director FM - soft services, Emaar Malls Group, Javeria Aijaz, director ICT, Farnek, and Tarek Nizameddin, senior executive director - commercial, Ejadah. Nizameddin believed that robots are the future of the FM industry. He said: “Robots will enhance productivity will enhance the safety and will reduce the dependency on labour. Robots will not replace manpower entirely though. I believe that eventually 30% to 40% of the labour will be replaced with robots.” Talking more the use of robots in various spheres of FM industry, Aijaz said: “When we look at technology in FM most of the efficiencies are driven around energy, where smart buildings reduce energy costs. IoT is implemented not only to monitor but control your remote assets making facilities and assets more sustain- able. But when we look into automation and robotics, we see most of the busi- ness cases applicable in the cleaning and security sectors. Robots not only increase efficiencies through automation of repeti- tive and manual tasks, eliminating hu- man errors and improving productivity, A BRIEF OVERVIEW OF WHAT TRANSPIRED AT THE FACILITIES MANAGEMENT VIRTUAL CONFERENCE 2020 FM VIRTUAL CONFERENCE 2020 CONCLUDES WITH PANELLISTS DEBATING ON THE INCREASED USE OF TECHNOLOGY DURING COVID-19 www.fm-middleeast.comDecember 2020 45 SPONSORS FM VIRTUAL CONFERENCE 2020 REPORT but more interestingly they can perform rather difficult tasks, which has to be done under high pressure or temperature such as cleaning at height.” Deutschbein added that there were several applications of robots in FM already, but it is important to know where they are best suitable. “Robots are not just useful for soft FM service, but they are also use for landscaping, pest control, and waste segregation, high-access cleaning, tank cleaning, etc. However, in order to evaluate where it can be use, you always have to consider the facility itself; the design of the facility, the occupancy of the facility, the size of the facility, among other factors. if I have the opportunity to use an automatic machine or robot in a confined space or in a high-risk task, I will always prefer to use robots rather than risk a human life,” she elaborated. Momtaz subsequently moved on to her final panel discussion, which spoke about the future of FM and if it will be less about people as a result of the ongo- ing pandemic. At this panel, she joined by Benjamin Wessendorf, business head at Isnaad; Evie Boustantzi, general manager at bfm; and Stan Mitchell, chairman & CEO at Key Facilities Management. On the topic of whether FM will be a less-labour intensive market, Mitchell believed otherwise. He elaborated: “FM I’ve always be- lieved is all about people. Ultimately, ev- erything that we do, within that context of an FM role ends up being about people at the end of the process. When we think about the technology that’s around today such as IoT, AI and machine learning, they will obviously take away some of the more mundane and repetitive tasks in FM. But as we introduce new technolo- gies, it will require different skills and different competencies that perhaps some of us don’t have to do. So I don’t neces- sarily see that FM will turn into a less labour-intensive market, but there will be a new and different labour-intensive market.” Talking about the future of FM from a soft-services perspective and if there will be a move towards output-based contracts, Benjamin stated that at the moment there is hybrid model where clients opt for a manpower driven ap- proach and a performance-based model. “In the UAE, soft services is adopting a hybrid stage. But do believe that there’s a transformation going on at the moment [towards pure output-based contracts]. And it will be great to see what hap- pens.” Boustantzi concludes by agreeing to Mitchell’s earlier view about FM being about people. Despite spending a major chunk of her education and experience in technology, she elaborates: “We should not lose sight of the bigger picture. Employees are not a commodity. They’re just people, you know, and even if you have the most educated, compe- tent, and technically knowledgeable per- son, unless they are motivated, they will never deliver that memorable service. So on the one hand, you have technology and systems, and on the other hand, you have the motivation of people. These two need to work together.” www.fm-middleeast.com46 December 2020 FM VIRTUAL CONFERENCE 2020 REPORT At the first panel discussion, Sara Momtaz posed the question on whether there has been an immediate need to adopt technology such as IoT and AI in this region because of the ongoing pandemic. Gary Reader, the general manager of ServeU, said that several firms are already working with intelligent solu- tions such CAFM systems, BMS, and energy management systems. How- ever, the pandemic has accelerated the use of technology. He said: “The pandemic has absolutely changed ev- erything. The more the automation, the less will be the use of manpower. The pandemic has definitely acceler- ated everything that was being done before.” Reader said that the pandemic has encouraged people to adopt technol- ogy. “When people have less access into premises, assets and clients areas, technology has helped people to see what information is available in the form of data such as detecting spikes or blockages.” Abdulla Al Wahedi, who is a facilities management expert in the region, agreed with Reader, stating that in the current situation, technol- ogy has supported connectivity and enabled communication. He said: “Technology has helped different companies to manage such an emer- gency and has provided the services needed without any interruptions.” Al Wahedi has over two decades of experience in facilities management holding a number of high-profile roles including his last role as CEO of Khidmah. Reader added that the key thing was “integrating various systems”. Al Wahedi agreed and elaborated that the integration and utilisation of the available technologies is not hap- pening as needed in the GCC region. He said: “Unfortunately, there is a disconnect between professionals and technology providers where you know you would have a system that has multiple modules and is not being utilised. You pay a fortune for this system. The best way to benefit is through integration and training.” Another panellist Mohannad F Almadhi, managing director of Musanadah FM in Al Khobar, Saudi, added that the market [in the GCC] is still developing and growing in FM. He said: “In order to jump into technology, we must have a mature market in terms of knowledge and operation. The growth of the FM market has been significant in adapt- ing to the concept of FM in transfer- ring from operation maintenance into facility management. Although tech- nology adoption is still taking time in this region, the government [in Saudi, for example] has pushed for more workshops in pro-government and semi-government entities during the past two to three years. Smart build- ings and systems are already there. Even the people who are learning are out there. But in terms of executing it on the ground, it is still taking some time. Everyone in the GCC region knows that technology in FM is beneficial, only the implementation is taking a bit longer than anticipated.” Almadhi concluded by saying that there are a large number of [CFAM] softwares available for end users such as facility managers and they may be too confused [to know or un- derstand which one to use]. He said: “Technology is evolving too fast for humans to understand and adopt.” The panellists at the fi rst panel discussion. PANEL 1: HAS THERE BEEN A GREATER PUSH TOWARDS TECHNOLOGY AGAINST THE BACKDROP OF THE PANDEMIC?www.fm-middleeast.comDecember 2020 47 FM VIRTUAL CONFERENCE 2020 REPORT At the second panel, Sara Momtaz was joined by An- drea Deutschbein, director FM - soft services, Emaar Malls Group, Javeria Aijaz, director ICT, Farnek, and Tarek Nizameddin, senior executive director - commercial, Ejadah. Nizameddin believed that robots are the future of the FM industry and will enhance productivity and safety by reducing dependency on labour. He said: “Robots will not replace manpower entirely though. I believe that eventu- ally 30% to 40% of the labour will be replaced with robots.” When it comes to Ejadah, Nizameddin said that the firm has invested in security robots which have been deployed in Yas Mall, Abu Dhabi, and Global Village. Ejadah’s security management arm Arkan relys on artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics to provide security services for its clients. He said: “We are using robotic technology to provide effective security service to our customers.The security ro- bots autonomously patrol defined routes. It can be linked to all existing BMS systems, and can operate independently or be controlled by an operator.” Talking more the use of robots in various spheres of FM industry, Aijaz added: “When we look at technology in FM most of the efficiencies are driven around energy, where smart buildings reduce energy costs. IoT is implemented not only to monitor but control your re- mote assets making facilities and assets more sustainable. But when we look into automation and robotics, we see most of the business cases applicable in the cleaning and security sectors. Robots not only increase efficiencies through automation of repetitive and manual tasks, eliminating human errors and im- proving productivity, but more interest- ingly they can perform rather difficult tasks; tasks which has to be done under high pressure or temperature, such as cleaning at heights.” From a value addition perspective, Aijaz refering to Nizameddin’s use of security robots, said that robotics are becoming a part of patrolling opera- tions. She said: “When AI and robotics are used together, robots are not just patrolling but also detecting suspicious activity and sending alerts back to the control room.” She said that this is the value addition of using robots. Aijaz added: “When we assign robots to jobs that humans cannot do or are in dan- ger to do, that is where the safety aspect comes in and this is the real value addi- tion.” She also said that the FM industry should adopt and integrate these [robotic] solutions in its service delivery model because it helps firms to become more reliable and provide efficient services. Deutschbein brought to the panel- lists’ attention that there were several applications of robots in FM already, but it was important to know where they are best suitable. She elaborated: “Robots are not just useful for soft FM services, but they are also used in landscap- ing, pest control, waste segregation, high-access cleaning, tank cleaning, etc. However, in order to evaluate where it can be used, you always have to consider the facility itself; that is, the design of the facility, the occupancy of the facil- ity, the size of the facility, among other factors. If I have the opportunity to use an automatic machine or robot in a con- fined space or in a high-risk task, I will always prefer to use robots rather than risk a human life.” When Momtaz prodded on whether robotics can be helpful for monitor- ing and operations only in soft services but when it comes to hard services only monitoring could be possible with current technologies in hand, to which Nizameddin agreed by saying: “I agree to a certain extent that robots will not be able to perform the task on hard ser- vices. But when it comes to IoT, machine learning, and big data, hard services will benefit more from it than soft services.” On whether robots will become the norm in the soft FM sector, Deutschbein said: “I don’t think it will be the new norm but I can see an increase in the use of robots. However, it depends on the task that needs to be performed.” The panellists at the second panel discussion.. PANEL 2: EVALUATING THE RISE OF ROBOTSwww.fm-middleeast.com48 December 2020 FM VIRTUAL CONFERENCE 2020 REPORT The third panel discussion of Facilities Management Virtual Conference 2020 addressed the future of FM and if it will be a less labour-intensive market as a result of the ongoing pandemic. Momtaz posed the question on whether the FM sector will now be less about people, to panellists Benjamin Wessendorf, business head at Isnaad; Evie Boustantzi, general manager at bfm; and Stan Mitchell, chairman & CEO at Key Facilities Management. Mitchell replied by believing the op- posite. He elaborated: “FM is all about people. Ultimately, everything that we do, within that context of an FM role ends up being about people at the end of the process. When we think about the technology that’s around today such as IoT, AI and machine learning, they will obviously take away some of the more mundane and repetitive tasks in FM. But as we introduce new technologies, it will require different skills and dif- ferent competencies that perhaps some of us don’t have to do. So I don’t neces- sarily see that FM will turn into a less labour-intensive market, but there will be a new and different labour-intensive market.” Boustantzi agreed to Mitchell’s view about FM being about people. Despite spending a major chunk of her educa- tion and experience in technology, she elaborated: “We should not lose sight of the bigger picture. Employees are not a commodity. They’re just people, and even if you have the most educated, competent, and technically knowledge- able person, unless they are motivated, they will never deliver that memorable service. So on the one hand, you have technology and systems, and on the other hand, you have the motivation of people. These two need to work together.” Mitchell added: “The challenges we face with the introduction of technol- ogy is exactly the same as the chal- lenges we faced 30 years ago with the introduction of FM as a concept. So it’s just about change and constant change. If we meet these challenges in the right way, we will move FM upwards and onwards against the current pandemic. We all are having to live with this pandemic. But for the FM community, this is a fantastic opportunity to change perceptions about who we are in this industry. We need to bring organisa- tions to use technology in a proactive manner, rather than in a reactive manner.” To this Boustantzi added: “We need to read the vibes of our times and see what really matters to people so that they care to be part of whatever we are aiming for. Most of us have thousands of, of employees. Are they really in it for themselves or for the company? Are we doing enough to unlock the potential in people? I think it’s really important at this point, especially as we start to in- corporate technology into everything. We shouldn’t forget about the human aspect.” Talking about the future of FM from a soft-services perspective and if there will be a move towards output-based contracts, Wessendorf stated that at the moment there is hybrid model where clients opt for a manpower driven approach and a performance-based model. He said: “In the UAE, soft ser- vices is adopting a hybrid stage. But I do believe that there’s a transformation going on at the moment [towards pure output-based contracts]. And it will be great to see what happens.” Wessendorf added: “Technology is a great tool for us. It will help us to deal with the more complex requirements of clients. But then again, everything is related to service quality, service culture and customer experience. We have to balance all of those and not get blinded by robotics and smart solutions.” The panellists at the third panel discussion. PANEL 3: WHAT DOES THE FUTURE HOLD FOR FM? WILL FM BE LESS ABOUT PEOPLE? TOP FM SUPPLIERS www.fm-middleeast.comDecember 2020 49 A B R I E F L I STI N G O F T H E TO P F M SU P P L I E R S I N T H E R E G I O N Top FM Suppliers 2020Next >