Have you heard of the term ‘Technology Debt’ and how it applies to manufacturing automation?
Welcome to episode 4 of a fourteen-part series by John Broadbent from Realise Potential.
In the IT world, it relates to the cost carried by a business for upgrading its systems, from laptops and desktops all the way to larger servers, operating systems, and databases. You see, most IT departments know this debt exists, and some know how much the amount is in dollar terms.
So why is this relevant to manufacturing?
In my last blog about the Ticking Time Bomb in automation systems, I referred to the hidden risk that a lot of manufacturers don't know exists. Sadly, technology debt in manufacturing automation systems is another one. Let me clarify by sharing a real-life situation that happened to me some years ago. And by the way, the names have been removed to protect the guilty!
As an automation specialist with skills in a particular piece of batching software, I received a call from the software distributor regarding a customer system that had developed an issue. I promptly called the client and headed to site, some two hours from Sydney.
On inspection, one of their four PCs that ran the batching programme had failed. And judging by the state of it, and the size of it, it was old!
I opened the cover and realised I was looking at a PC from around the late-1990s which had what were known as ‘ISA’ expansion slots, and in one of them, a proprietary network card used to communicate with their PLC network. The other three PCs that were working ran Windows 98.
I spoke with the plant manager and explained that, one, finding a PC with ISA slots would be a challenge as the modern PCs had what's known as PCI slots, so the proprietary PLC network card wouldn't work and would have to be replaced. And even if I found one, we'd have to load Windows 98 and install all the software again, so did they have any original media to do this?
They didn't know and would look around.
I left site and went exploring the internet. I couldn't find a local PC that would do the job, as those that still had supported the old ISA slot architecture didn't have configurable interrupts that would be needed to accommodate the old ISA cards.
So that was a dead end.
The only way out of this was to recommend a new PC.
However, the knock-on effect went something like this: the new PC would run a newer version of Windows, Windows 7 from memory, but the SCADA software version they had wouldn't run on this version of Windows, so they would have to upgrade and migrate their old application. However, they hadn't paid for annual support and didn't have access to the upgrades and would have to buy them.
The other three PCs, then, wouldn't talk with this new one, so they'd have to be upgraded too, plus a full software reinstallation. They'd need a new PLC network card to fit the new PCI slots, but then the PLC itself would also need an upgrade of its network card.
Starting to get the picture?
The estimated cost for all of this was $60,000!
Imagine being the factory manager, not knowing you were sitting on this one area of technology debt, then being asked to part with an unbudgeted $60,000.
What would you do?
Well, he simply said they didn't have that sort of money and they'd now operate with three terminals.
Think about that for a moment.
If there was ever a classic case of kicking the can down the road, this was it.
I guess short term, the production manager saved the company $60,000 for now, so he was the hero. However, this would become someone else's problem in the future when another PC failed. It was just a matter of time. Then, perhaps, they'd be down to two terminals.
You might think stories like these are uncommon, but sadly, they're not. Speak with any automation business and they'll have plenty of their own war stories.
Of course, there's a solution to this, and that is to be aware of what you have on your factory floor and ask some important questions:
- Is it obsolete?
- Can we get spares?
- What will it cost to upgrade to the latest versions?
- Are we on annual support packages which give us access to patches and software upgrades?
- Do we have service-level agreements, also known as SLAs, in place which guarantee response times to minimise downtime?
- What is our exposure in terms of capital expenditure?
- And do we have an upgrade or replacement plan in place?
- Where is our highest risk?
So the biggest question, which relates to the title of this blog is, “What is the technology debt you are currently carrying into your future? Do you know how much it is?”
It's not an easy question to answer, however, it is one that must be asked, discussed, and a roadmap put in place on how this is to be minimised, otherwise, you risk becoming another war story.
If you need any help with this, you can reach out to me on LinkedIn or via the Realise Potential website. In the meantime, stay safe and well, and may all your machines keep running, even the old ones!
John Broadbent
Watch John's original LinkedIn video here.
