In the mid nineteen-nineties, I sat in a meeting with the country’s largest transportation contractor. We had made several presentations on the newest machine control technologies (your typical “death-by PowerPoint” :-).  It was well presented however and to the point. The contractor purchased several systems and was successful in implementing the technology.  That was not surprising, as the systems delivered an excellent return on investment, a just reward for an early adopter.  What was surprising was their response when we asked them what else we could do for them.  They asked if we could also provide location information for their compressors on each job site.  This threw us off a bit because we wanted to discuss big, complex, forward-looking- solutions that were very high-tech for the time.

As we discussed their request we began to understand, what today is called, “asset management”.  There are many examples of this in use today, supplied by multiple manufacturers.  But the capability of these solutions has grown substantially.  Not only can you know where your assets are but additional information about them as well.  In the case of a piece of heavy equipment; you can know its position, but also its run time, idle time, maintenance needs, etc.  Additional capabilities have been recently added that allows you to see the machine’s position relative the design digital terrain model (DTM).  Improvements in communications and the use of the internet have made it possible to send data from the office to machines, from machine to machine and more.

The power and scope of the Internet has had a major impact and widened the range of possibilities for managing assets and projects.  It is now possible to manage machines and projects remotely regardless of the distances involved as data can be exchanged worldwide, wherever there is internet access.  If you have the personnel that can analyze DTM data and prepare payment requests on earthwork quantities only at your home office, this is no longer a constraint.  If you are an equipment manger working from a centralized location, you wouldn’t have to wait for daily reports to be sent from every job site, since real-time, remote access is now an option.

These powerful new technologies provide position and other vital information via various communication devices and/or the Internet. The technology is changing the way projects are managed.  The future holds even more exciting developments as the technology matures and new capabilities come on line.  All of these new tools will have an impact on your procedures, staffing requirements, direct costs and your bottom line.