Articles
Read articles by the Avathon staff on artificial intelligence and how AI is transforming industry
AI-Powered Solutions Prepare International Business for Tariff Turmoil
Responding to recent announcements of impending changes to international trade regulations and tariffs, companies have, as described in a Forbes article, announced a variety of reactive approaches, including seeking alternative manufacturing sources, stockpiling inventory, and diversifying their supply chains. However, none of these tactics can happen quickly and they all come with associated costs, e.g., the tying up of operating cash that’s required to stockpile unneeded inventory.
Visual AI Transforms Retail Store Operations
Retail and convenience store operators face many challenges, including labor shortages, traffic management, theft/pilferage, and customer/employee safety. Also, unlike online retailing, which is replete with data on everything from sales performance and returns to evolving customer preferences, physical stores often do not have access to such data. They can’t easily track and measure individual touchpoints between customers and the business, key information for improving customer experience and store profitability. Artificial intelligence (AI) is uniquely poised to change this scenario and has begun doing so for several companies Avathon has worked with in recent years.
AI Optimizes Battery Energy Storage System Performance
With renewable energy asset deployment rapidly growing to meet ambitious carbon-reduction goals, the success of wind and energy generation depends increasingly on the ability to store energy to meet inconsistent demand swings. That goal is achieved using battery energy storage systems (BESS), which are fast becoming a crucial component of renewable project success. As battery storage has grown in recent years—expected to total 30 GW by the end of 2024 in the U.S.—there is an equally growing need for solutions to monitor and maintain these complex assets. To deliver on their many benefits, BESS systems—like all technology assets—require continuous performance tracking and occasional maintenance.
Industrial AI Streamlines Oil and Gas Operations
Over the past decade, the oil and gas industry has made major investments in artificial intelligence, identifying a wide range of opportunities for operational improvement as a result. According to Gartner, over 39% of industry leaders are increasing their oil and gas AI investment in 2022 and projecting a total spend in excess of $2 billion. O&G AI is a game-changing opportunity for a critical energy industry For many years, energy companies have collected vast quantities of performance information, hoping they can identify applications that will make effective use of the data. But this rarely occurs – partly due to the immensity of the information, partly because traditional tools
How Can Warfighters Utilize AI to Improve Military Supply Chain Management?
“In today’s rapidly evolving defense manufacturing and operations landscape, maintaining an agile and resilient supply chain is more important than ever. Leveraging cutting-edge artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) technology, our team empowers the DoD and Defense Primes to mitigate disruptions by proactively identifying risks and optimizing logistics and supply chain operations.” This sentiment, expressed by Avathon Government President and General Manager Art Sellers, succinctly describes the challenges faced by modern warfighters and the processes that keep them supplied with weapons, ammunition, and support systems. Defense supply chain optimization is critical. In a recent podcast—-How the Air Force is Using AI to Fix Supply Chain Challenges—-Sellers went on to
Industrial AI Boosts CPG Sustainability
Few industries adapt as quickly to consumer wants and needs as manufacturing. As goods like food, beverages, and household products require routine replacement or replenishment, consumer-packaged-goods (CPG) manufacturers must be at the top of their game throughout the entire supply chain process to meet and exceed those needs while also maintaining product quality. Using Industrial AI to reduce waste and promote sustainability both saves money and improves consumer sentiment about the brand. Is using Industrial AI to reduce waste really that important? In a 2022 IBM study with the National Retail Federation: Half of consumers say they’ve paid up to a 59% premium for products branded as sustainable. 62% of
Visual AI Improves Oil & Gas Safety
In 2010, the International Association of Oil and Gas Producers issued its Report 459, creating a set of 18 rules designed to minimize the number of fatal accidents happening at oil & gas work sites. In 2018, they revised this set of rules, reducing the list to nine and making them more succinct and actionable than the original set. As part of the release of the updated report, the IOGP asserted that more than 375 lives would have been saved over the previous decade had these rules been followed. Visual AI, in combination with Avathon Industrial AI platform, plays a large role in keeping oil & gas operations safe. Health,
How Can AI Optimize Supply Chain Performance?
Unexpected spikes in demand, a lack of workers in factories, and out-of-balance shipping operations can all lead to compromised supply chain performance. The increasing variety of goods offered to consumers also require shippers to operate with as much agility as possible in the face of countless day-to-day challenges. Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) can streamline and optimize supply chain operations, provide greater visibility and flexibility, and prevent expensive asset downtime caused by inadequate maintenance programs. Industrial AI provides wide-ranging supply chain technology solutions AI technology offers a wide range of potential applications for optimizing supply chain operations. Perhaps the most valuable element of AI in supply chains,
Normal Behavior Modeling: Prescription for Performance
Normal behavior modeling (NBM) is an approach to process, system, and equipment management and maintenance enabled by recent advances in industrial artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML). NBM is applicable to a wide range of operational fields-–in practice, any in which normal operation can be quantified from available data. Seeing the big picture with industrial AI There are several compelling advantages of NBM, accessed via an Industrial AI platform. The most significant benefit is the ability to continuously monitor and provide proactive alerts for maintenance problems on complex systems of components. These alerts are based not on individual parameters but a holistic understanding of the entire system. This
Looking into AI Asset Performance Management for Renewables? It’s All About the Data
A few weeks back we began exploring the role of Asset Performance Management (APM) systems and their impact on renewable power generation. To gain further insight into this technology, we turn once again to Avathon Product Manager Clara Midgley, who took part in a recent analyst interview in which this relationship was investigated in depth. Although the many benefits of artificial intelligence (AI) in the renewable energy space (and indeed throughout the energy industry) are by now well understood (more efficient operations, more accurate forecasting, greater worker safety, to name but a few), the challenges associated with successfully implementing the technology are somewhat less well appreciated, partly because of the
Can Normal Behavior Modeling Optimize Asset Performance?
The goal of any company is to employ assets to maximize production and revenue. So it’s crucial to manage expenses by minimizing routine or unscheduled maintenance. It all boils down to increasing the useful life of expensive capital equipment. Historically, these goals have been pursued using condition-based monitoring (CBM) solutions or OEM-provided asset management tools. However, in a world where equipment is increasingly reliable, and failure data scarce, traditional approaches are far less effective than they could be. Normal behavior modeling: a new AI tool for an old problem Artificial intelligence-enabled Normal Behavior Modeling (NBM) in predictive maintenance of complex systems, simultaneously automates performance data analysis while minimizing alert
How Can AI Minimize Critical Drilling Rig Failures?
Offshore drilling is an expensive business. Downtime can make those costs balloon exponentially. According to research firm Kimberlite, the average offshore drilling rig experiences 27 days of unplanned downtime annually, resulting in about $38 million in losses. Companies are beginning to look to rig maintenance powered by artificial intelligence to drive down these costs. Small maintenance challenges have been solved through redundancy. For example, there are typically three mud pumps on a given rig. If one of them should fail, it’s inconvenient, but not catastrophic. This backup approach applies as well to generators, pumps, and many other types of equipment. But what about top drive breakdowns that cannot typically be
Asset Performance Management Systems Utilize AI to Power Renewable Solutions
Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology has delivered a wide range of compelling benefits to industry, arguably the most impactful of which has been the ability to predict the failure of expensive assets and prescribe actions that can mitigate, or even eliminate, these failures. One of the primary beneficiaries of this technology to date has been renewable energy. The various applications of AI to renewables—whether wind, solar, or battery systems—are known collectively as Asset Performance Management (APM) systems. In the APM space, AI provides invaluable insights that contribute directly to more efficient operation of wind (onshore and offshore), solar, and battery storage systems. “Our goal is to understand and quantify performance, and
Visual Systems Use the Power of AI to Maximize Effectiveness
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is now seemingly everywhere. It’s in the news nearly every day: self-driving cars, the latest ChatGPT release, algorithms that accurately predict equipment failures or select stocks for your 401k, behind-the-scenes software that completes your text sentences for you. It’s inescapable and will only become more so in the years to come. Many grandiose claims are made each day about how AI will make all our lives better: less manual work; more timely, accurate outcomes; even a 21% increase in U.S. GDP by 2030. So why are only about a third of companies actively using the technology today? AI is an extra set of hands, enhancing employees’ ability
Aging Global Infrastructure and the Role of AI
Much attention has been focused in recent years on our national infrastructure, particularly following passage of the $1 trillion Bipartisan Infrastructure Law in 2021. Much of our current infrastructure was built several decades ago and now shows signs of severe wear and degradation. Inevitably, this attention rises to the fore whenever there is a well-publicized failure: a bridge collapses, a pipe bursts, or a highway is closed for emergency repair. And this state of affairs is by no means limited to the United States. Major infrastructure improvements are taking place globally, and AI-optimized maintenance is playing a vital role. The challenge of infrastructure decay and upgrading is particularly acute in