Hydro Tasmania 'DIY' rollout of new mobile asset-inspection software

Australia’s largest water manager empowers all its technicians and planners with new mobile asset management app

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mobile asset management

Energy and Utilities Customer Success Story with Neptune DXP

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Challenges

-Existing mobile asset-management app was costly for only 20 frequent users

-Constant upgrades cost precious full-time employee time along with consulting costs

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Solutions

-Implement a new mobile asset management app that seamlessly integrated with existing SAP ERP backend

-Create an easy-to-use app to increase user base no matter your technology background

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Results

-No new technology needed to be implemented – use of existing iPads

-Able to use existing in-house skill set to implement

-Only 2 hours of training needed per site

-Seamless integration to SAP and increased user adoption

Challenge: Hydro Tasmania was facing the need to upgrade its previous mobile asset management solution, SAP Work Manager which was costly for only 20 everyday users and 100 infrequent users.

When it comes to implementing mobile apps for your business, sometimes it just ‘Worx’ to do it yourself. This was the case for Hydro Tasmania’s device–agnostic asset-management application, deployed independently with minimal user training. It allows them to inspect assets offline, attach photos and videos and see work orders by geographic location.

Hydro Tasmania is Australia’s leading clean energy business and the largest generator of renewable energy. It employs more than 1,200 people and manages a large asset footprint to produce approximately 9,000-gigawatt-hours of clean electricity from hydropower. That’s enough to sustainably power 900,000 Australian homes and businesses.

Hydro Tasmania owns, operates and maintains 30 hydropower stations, 54 major dams, 188 headwork gates and valves 22 Canals, 19 tunnels, 43 pipelines, 63 generators, 1 gas-fired power station and power generation and distribution on Bass Strait islands.

Hydro Tasmania implemented its previous mobile asset-management app in 2013. It took two full-time consultants approximately eight weeks, and three employees to roll out SAP Work Manager to 120 users on 120 devices.

Two years later, SAP Work Manager required an upgrade, costing the business a further eight weeks of investment in two full-time consultants and two employees. The business also opted for another four weeks of consulting to improve sync speed. Hydro Tasmania had around 20 regular users who were getting significant value from the app on a daily basis and another 100 infrequent users that were getting limited benefits from the app.

“Ultimately, upgrades were costing the business a lot for a relatively small user base,” explains Anthony Pierotti, SAP Functional Analyst (now Planning Supervisor) for Hydro Tasmania.

Continue reading below…

Solution: Implement a new solution leveraging internal resources and minimal vendor support

In 2018, Hydro Tasmania reviewed the market for a new mobile asset management application that connected harmoniously with its SAP ERP back-end and fit its existing and required data structures. As a confident SAP house, it wanted to implement and maintain the new solution with internal resources and minimal vendor support.

Hydro Tasmania required new functionality including GIS Maps and add components as well as improved functionality for work orders, notifications and attaching documents and videos. They also wanted to increase the regular user base from 20 to about 50, which includes generation technicians, supervisors and administrators.

BlueWorx is Zag’s easy-to-use, comprehensive and affordable solution for mobilizing SAP Plant Maintenance that works where users are. Hydro Tasmania selected BlueWorx for the following reasons:
“Faster sync times and more data transferred.” BlueWorx synchronization with SAP is swift and painless and works in the background.

“Ability to use both mobile devices and desktop with a consistent look and feel.” – BlueWorx is device-agnostic working across iOS, Android, Windows 10 and desktop browsers.

“Fiori look and feel with offline capability.” – Built using Neptune DXP, BlueWorx has the latest SAPUI5 Fiori user experience (UX) and works completely offline which is perfect for remote areas of operation without connectivity.

“It can be used by different workgroups with different requirements.” – BlueWorx is very adaptable to unique requirements, for example, asset-specific inspections can be easily configured in the administration and monitoring console.

“It can easily be supported by Hydro Tasmania’s developers, greatly reducing the total cost of ownership.” – BlueWorx is fast and simple to deploy, enhance and support, and requires no middleware or additional infrastructure, delivered from within an SAP ERP or SAP S/4HANA system.

Results: An app that requires minimal training and utilizes existing technologies and talents

Hydro Tasmania opted to install and configure BlueWorx themselves with minor assistance from Zag. This involved two days of initial consulting to familiarize themselves with the product and ongoing ad-hoc support from the Zag product development team when required.

The implementation took 60 days end-to-end using functional, development, basis and security personnel part-time with involvement from business users. BlueWorx was rolled out to 49 users tasked with inspecting and maintaining hydropower assets across 2,000 locations. Despite the larger scale, there was only one performance-related bug after the first month of use.

Vance Chinnery, IP and S – (Acting) Corporate Solutions Manager/SAP Solution Architect said, “BlueWorx was fast and easy to deploy with the initial setup taking our people only 30 days. The implementation costs were minimal too, despite us deploying the solution to a larger user base.”

“As you’re completely within the ABAP environment coding ABAP or JavaScript – everything is visible with no black boxes,” adds Matt Harding, SAP Technical Advisor and Developer.

“The BlueWorx team at Zag were readily available to provide support and guidance throughout our BlueWorx implementation. They understood what we wanted to achieve and helped us to make the right moves towards a swift, successful outcome.” – Anthony Pierotti, SAP Functional Analyst

Hydro Tasmania was the first to implement both BlueWorx and Crew, a new optional component of BlueWorx that allows supervisors to schedule and monitor work orders, and their staff, on the fly.

With BlueWorx Crew, supervisors easily view tasks assigned to their team and can allocate, reallocate and manage them directly, in near real-time, via the console. Planners can juggle field workers’ schedules efficiently according to changes in priorities and resources.

After all, work that is allocated faster is work completed sooner. Fewer delays and less paperwork mean lower costs, well-maintained assets and better business outcomes.

For Hydro Tasmania, “the low implementation cost, streamlined deployment and swift user uptake were driven by BlueWorx being a great match for the business’ existing skills, technology and data,” said Anthony Pierotti, evidenced below.

Amount of new technology implemented – BlueWorx was deployed on Hydro Tasmania’s existing iPads and utilizes the same SAP database and app servers. The development languages are ABAP and JavaScript which is the same as Fiori.

Match between existing skills and required skills – The SAP and related skills required to implement BlueWorx Crew were skills Hydro Tasmania already had resourced internally – basis, development (knowledge of ABAP and JavaScript) and functional (knowledge of SAP Plant Maintenance).

Data changes required – Hydro Tasmania found that BlueWorx supported the data structures created for its previous solution, so they plan to gradually migrate this data to BlueWorx over time. New data creation aligns with BlueWorx data structures to fully gain the benefits of the solution.

Number of enhancements needed – Only a few enhancements were executed, including a measurement reading input screen and the ability for contractors to timesheet against purchase orders.

“Zag completed these enhancements and kindly modified the timing and order of BlueWorx road map items to align with Hydro Tasmania’s needs,” Anthony Pierotti, SAP Functional Analyst.

Number and duration of training courses – Training is broken into process and system training. Process training was very small due to this being a migration from an existing mobile solution to a new one. The simplicity of BlueWorx means minimal training time is required – only two hours per location.

“The team finds the interface simple to navigate and very easy to use. They like using BlueWorx, which makes support of the software a breeze.” Anthony Pierotti, SAP Functional Analyst

‘Worx’ now and in the future…
BlueWorx Crew fits Hydro Tasmania’s requirements as it has the right balance between extensive functionality and simplicity of configuration and use. It has many features to streamline the support of a larger user base and has a rapid development cycle.

Now embedded in the business, Hydro Tasmania is rolling out BlueWorx Crew to other areas of the business, including; engineering, facilities, land care and Bass Strait islands. Hydro Tasmania continues to benefit from the road map of BlueWorx Crew innovations as they are released.

Company Snapshot

Hydro TasmaniaHydro Tasmania has been at the forefront of clean energy innovation for over one hundred years. They are Australia’s largest producer of clean energy – generating hydro and wind power – and the largest water manager in the country. Hydro Tasmania has 55 major dams, operates 30 hydropower stations and has built some of Australia’s largest wind farms.

Industry Focus: Energy and Utilities
Timeline:  60 days
System Version: SAP ERP
Devices: iPads/iOS
Solution Scope: Create a new mobile asset management application that connects to their SAP ERP backend and fits existing and required data structures

“The team finds the interface simple to navigate and very easy to use. They like using BlueWorx, which makes support of the software a breeze.”

-Anthony Pierotti, SAP Functional Analyst at Zag

About Zag, Part of Accenture

Zag is trusted by more than 80 organisations across Australasia to provide SAP, Cloud and Neptune Software solutions, support and consulting. Zag was formed in 1996 as a specialist SAP implementation partner and has delivered more SAP ERP projects in New Zealand (NZ) than anyone else. The aim was to build a business known for quality implementation advice and guidance at an affordable price. Since then, Zag has built the Zag Support Centre (Asia Pacific’s first certified SAP Partner Centre of Expertise), was the first to achieve SAP Gold Partner status in NZ and became the exclusive NZ partner for Neptune Software. Zag has offices in Auckland, Melbourne, Sydney, and Wellington in addition to partners selling its products globally.

About Neptune Software

Neptune Software is a rapid application development platform vendor with more than 660 enterprise customers and over 3.5 million licensed end users globally that empowers IT departments to deliver tangible business outcomes. Neptune Software offers with its Neptune DXP, a leading low-code, SAP-centric, enterprise app development platform to digitize and optimize business processes and user interfaces – at scale and with ease. Neptune DXP provides a fast and cost-effective way to industrialize the development of custom applications – saving companies time and money on development, integration, and operations

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