Made-in-Canada maintenance software assesses financial risk too

Materials and Manufacturing Ontario (MMO) has created a new spin-off company which will help improve the industrial performance and competitiveness of Canadian manufacturers. Optimal Maintenance Decisions (OMDEC) will commercialize a new software tool that predicts and avoids equipment failures. This new optimizing technology, EXAKT, which enhances the accuracy of equipment failure predictions, was created at the University of Toronto’s CBM (condition based maintenance) Lab.
Developed by Dr. Andrew Jardine at the University of Toronto, EXAKT evaluates the economic consequences of equipment failures and preventive maintenance. The methodology incorporates a statistical technique to extract useful knowledge from available data records and create a model that can be integrated into maintenance management systems. EXAKT generates optimal maintenance decisions by processing new condition and events data and builds a financial formula to assess overall risk of failure.
“Our clients are leaders in their fields who have complex equipment with a high cost of failure. For them, consistent, reliable performance is the most important aspect of what they do,” says Ben Stevens, president of OMDEC. “Making more accurate and effective maintenance decisions is a competitive advantage for companies competing in the global marketplace. With EXAKT, you remove the guesswork around failure and assure equipment uptime.”
“This is a perfect example of how MMO is helping to build a strong, competitive economy in the future – with an aggressive focus on innovation, collaboration between academic institutions and industry, and accelerating the commercialization of new products and processes,” says Geoff Clarke, president and CEO, Materials and Manufacturing Ontario.
MMO is a not-for-profit corporation supported by the provincial government, industrial contributions to research programs, membership fees, and revenues from the commercialization and licensing of intellectual property. Its aim is to promote commercial research partnerships between post-secondary research institutions and industry.