Greg Davies, Operations Director at Concerto, discusses their integrated asset management solution, their on-going commitment to Government Soft Landings and his thoughts on ‘the golden thread’
WHY DID YOU DEVELOP THE CONCERTO SOUTION?
We originally developed the Concerto solution to directly support transformation projects within the UK Local Government, specifically to support Government collaborative strategy in managing estates and large-scale capital projects. Now it is used in both the public and private sector in all sorts of contexts.
We recognised the need for the Public Sector to move away from using disparate systems and knew we could offer significant efficiency savings via an integrated, web-based solution with all relevant comprehensive functionality under one umbrella – project, performance, asset and facilities management. Concerto also integrates with external finance solutions so organisations can manage the entire asset lifecycle process without jumping from one solution or plugin, to another.
SO HOW DOES CONCERTO SUPPORT THE SOFT LANDINGS FRAMEWORK?
The solution supports PAS1192-2:2013 both in terms of information management and handover.
The management, collaborative exchange and validation of data takes place in a single, Common Data Environment (CDE) which supports 2D and 3D visual data rendering, as well as transferable and scalable detailed data sets.
We also consider how the Asset Management, Operation and Maintenance of the project will be carried out and ensure handover of validated data to the Facilities Management phase.
Our initial development of BIM was directed at the handover from the project phase to the operational phase. Initially, the functionality was based around capturing and importing data from COBie and automatically building the MEP equipment register against the property asset, then utilising that MEP asset data for planned maintenance and reactive maintenance purposes. This allowed organisations to track asset full life cycle costs, encompassing areas such as reactive and planned maintenance, which then feeds a myriad of additional benefits.
We then examined the relationship between PAS1192 2 and 3, and continued our development to allow the capability for the Concerto system to collate and validate the data during the project phase, so when it is taken into the asset register, it is correct and relevant and in full support of PAS1192 & 3, which mean no more chasing Alice down the rabbit hole, as ‘one truth’ of the data exists.
With this in place, we are now in the position to guarantee project and asset BIM data is validated, handed over and all held in one central environment for the full life cycle of the asset. This maintains the essential ‘Golden Thread’, which is often lost in the construction process.
TELL US ABOUT YOUR INVOLVEMENT WITH THE MANCHESTER TOWN HALL PROJECT?
Our BIM developments stemmed from relationships with customers in the Public Sector who were becoming more aware of the requirements of the Government Soft Landings strategy for BIM.
3 years ago, Manchester City Council invited us to attend a meeting with Laing O Rourke and NG Bailey about the Town Hall Complex, where we discussed how BIM data would be leveraged on the project in support of the government Soft Landing strategy for BIM. Lots of questions were asked across the table, and from this meeting, we formulated our initial ideas of what we really needed to achieve with regards to BIM.
We went away and at our cost developed the initial BIM functionality. We then came back to the table with a proof of concept perspective how we envisage BIM to operate within our system. They loved it.
AND, HOW IS THE FM TEAM AT MANCHESTER GETTING ON 3 YEARS DOWN THE LINE?
The FM Managers at Manchester state that the interface is simple to use by FM teams. For example, If a building user reports that a room is too cold, the FM team can access data relating to the systems supplying heat to that room and isolate these from the highly complex M&E systems supplying everything else. This makes it much easier for them to identify potentially defective items, such as the boiler supplying the cold room. Once the offending piece of kit has been identified, it is centred on the user’s screen and placed in context, enabling the FM team to work out how to access it. They can also link to the operation and maintenance manuals and fault codes for that boiler, historical work, cost and survey information.
Data can also be downloaded to mobile devices, which is particularly useful when working on systems buried deep in a basement or in a remote area where there no data signal available.
They’re now using Concerto across the Council for complete operational management of the entire corporate property portfolio, which includes condition surveys, estates management and much more, enabling the building of detailed financial information on of the council’s assets.
HOW WELL DO YOU FIT INTO PRIVATE SECTOR INDUSTRY?
The key reason why large private sector organisations also engage with us is because we are able to demonstrate the engineering data being captured and utilised during the operational life of the building is validated and carried through the process within a centralised, web based and integrated software environment. This is attractive for organisations who have large, geographically disparate, and complex asset portfolios, as the costs to manage these portfolios account for a large percentage of budget spend, so every penny spent that doesn’t need to be reduces profitability.
WHAT MAKES CONCERTO’S OFFERING STAND OUT?
We offer a very holistic solution based on an understanding that no two organisations operate in the same way. We have purposely developed our solutions to be intrinsically flexible so that clients can configure the software to their ways of working. Our clients are very positive about our solution and their relationship with us as a team, as we have always focused on good relations, usability, powerful functionality and value for money.
We believe that by allowing our customers to have a direct influence over the future development of the functionality; we aim to ensure the future relevance of our solutions within their organisations….we have never lost a client so we must be doing something right!
ABOUT CONCERTO
Concerto’s software portfolio enables customers in both the public and private sector to improve the performance, productivity and quality standards of asset and project management functions, meet and exceed set KPIs and realise the associated cost savings. We provide a range of solutions, which can interlink or stand-alone and are highly adaptable and scalable to a range of organisations and requirements. Please contact us for further information.
T: 0844 8589171
