The Asset Management Council was pleased to participate in the 2021 International Conference on Maintenance and Intelligent Asset Management.
The International Conference on Maintenance and Intelligent Asset Management (ICMIAM2021) was jointly organized by Federation University Australia, IIT Kharagpur and Manipal Academy of Higher Education, India and supported by the Asset Management Council Australia, the Institute of Rural Management Anand, Lulea University of Technology Sweden, the University of Huddersfield, UK and the Technical sponsorship by IEEE Victoria Section, Australia from 12th to 15th December 2021.
Outstanding keynotes were delivered by Dr Gopi Chattopadhyay on the capability building of Industries and Professionals through Asset Management, Maintenance and Reliability Engineering (MRE) Programmes in Federation University Australia; Swami Sunishthananda on Positive influencing factors of Spiritual paradigm that may be adopted to human aspects of Asset Management; Mr John Hardwick on How Asset Management creates values for organisations, especially during turbulent times; Ms Wendy McPate on Challenges in the Energy industry as we transition to a lower Carbon future and Prof Jhareswar Maiti on Safety and Risk Analytics – Issues, Challenges and Future Directions. Three parallel technical sessions were run on Asset Management (AM) and Systems (AMS) in Track1, Reliability, Availability and Maintainability (RAM) and Maintenance Management (MM) in Track 2 and Safety Engineering and Analytics (SEA), Security, Risk Management and Human Factors (SRM-HF) in Track 3.
An important feature of day two of the conference was the keynote address by Revered Swamiji Sunishthananda, Resident Monk, Vedanta Centre Melbourne who brought a different context to asset management. His insight on the human and spiritual aspects aligned with Asset Management and life management, especially an attitude to asset management as a service to be an integral part of the materialistic world and technology was though provoking and a significant part of this conference.
Keynotes on day three were delivered by Dave Danes on Global Certification in Asset Management. Professor Uday Kumar on New Technology Empowered Asset Management – Issues, Challenges and Future Directions, Professor Melinda Hodkiewicz on AI On Maintenance Data – Challenges To Value Delivery, Prof. Theodore T. Allen on Cybersecurity “Super-Critical” Vulnerabilities and Control Policies, Dr. O.B. Krishna on Analytics Based Integrated Safety Management System, Professor Raghuvir Pai Keynote on Role Of Tribology In Maintenance And Asset Management, Professor Rakesh Mishra on Energy, Emissions and the Environment, Professor Harekrishna Misra on The Track On Rural Asset Management and Professor Pradip Kumar Ray on Ergonomic Design of Human-Product Interface in Healthcare Systems.
Asset Management, Maintenance, reliability engineering and digital aspects including Industry4.0 have become essential areas of concern for many industries and infrastructure owners, operators and maintainers. There were over 70 sessions including 53 technical papers in 3 parallel tracks, keynotes in day2 and day3 and workshops in day1 along with the inaugural session in day2 and closing session in day3.
The delegates registered from 16 countries including Australia, New Zealand, India, Sweden, UK, Bangladesh, Canada, Ireland, Indonesia, Kuwait, South Africa, Ecuador, USA, Philippines, Taiwan, Portugal and many other parts of the world. Full papers were reviewed and accepted based on reviews in line with the requirements of the technical sponsor IEEE’s rigorous quality assurance process.
This event was only possible due to collaboration with the Federation University Australia and conference partners, especially General Chair Dr. Gopinath Chattopadhay, Joint Chairs Dave Daines, Kai Dong and Jacqui Bates from Asset Management Council, Australia, Professor Jhareswar Maiti, IIT Kharagpur, Prof. Raghuvir Pai, Manipal Academy of Higher Education. Outstanding support was provided by Prof Duncan Bentley, Vice-Chancellor and President and Professor Syed Islam, acting DVCRI and Dean of the School of Engineering, IT and Physical Sciences from Federation University. This also includes Technical Chair Professor Joarder Kamruzzaman, Organisation Chair Dr. Harpreet Kandra, Track Chair A/Professor Gour Karmakar, Jo-ann Larkins, Dr. Abdul Choudhury, Katrina Southurst, Bec Davis, Louise Drohan, Liz River and Evan Dekker from Federation University Australia, and Track Chairs A/Professor Sayak Roychowdhury from IIT Kharagpur, A/Professor Nitesh Kumar from Manipal Academy of Higher Education, India.
In the inaugural session, Dr. Gopi Chattopadhyay, General Chair of ICMIAM2021 and Postgraduate programme coordinator Maintenance and Reliability Engineering (MRE), Federation University Australia introduced the dignitaries and conference partners. Acknowledgement of the Country and Welcome message was delivered by Prof Syed Islam, the Acting DVC Research and Innovation, and Dean School of SEITPS, Federation University Australia; The Ceremony: Acknowledgement of the Country was organised by Katrina Beer, Manager Aboriginal Education Centre, Federation University Australia; Inauguration and welcome speech was delivered by Prof Duncan Bentley, Vice Chancellor and President, Federation University Australia; The session was then followed by messages from Cr Daniel Moloney, Mayor, City of Ballarat and Honorable Jason Wood, Assistant Minister for Customs, Community Safety and Multicultural Affairs. Opening words were delivered by Mr Dave Daines, National Chair, Asset Management Council and Head of Campus, Assoc Prof Sam Henson, who welcomed delegates to Mt Helen Campus.
Dr Gopi Chattopadhyay, then, talked about the background of the conference and shared that the conference was built upon a long history. Maintenance, Reliability and Asset Management events are held in Churchill campus of Federation University Australia since 2016. Endeavour Executive Fellowship award workshops in 2018, Research and Industry Day (RAID 2020 and 2021) events showcased projects from Maintenance and Reliability Engineering (MRE) Postgraduate Programmes on Federation University and ICMIAM2020 conference was held in Bangalore, India.
Messages were presented by collaborators, Prof Virendra Kumar Tewari, Director, IIT Kharagpur; Lt Gen (Dr) M D Venkatesh, VSM (Retd), Vice Chancellor, Manipal Academy of Higher Education; Prof Umakant Dash, Director, IRMA and Dr Enamul Haque, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) Power and Engineering Society, Victoria Chapter, Australia; Prof Joarder Kamruzzaman, from the Centre for Smart Analytics, Federation University Australia welcomed delegates to the technical sessions and a note of thanks was delivered by Dr Harpreet S Kandra, Organizing Chair, ICMIAM2021.
The conference was supported by the City of Ballarat and Sovereign Hill, Ballarat. The next conference is proposed to be held in Dec 2022 by IRMA supported by current partners including Federation University Australia, Asset Management Council Australia, Asset Management Society India, Manipal Academy of Higher Education, India, IIT Kharagpur India and many others.
The closing session was addressed by the Indian Consulate General Melbourne Honorable Mr Raj Kumar, Victorian Campus Heads of FedUni, Ms Kathy Racunica, Berwick, Ms Leigh Kennedy, Churchill and Associate Professor Geoffrey Lord, Wimmera. Associate Professor Gour Karmakar on behalf of Technical Program Committee ICMIAM2021, Mr Dave Daines, Dr Harpreet S Kandra, and Professor Jhareswar Maiti thanked delegates on behalf of the Organising Team. Welcome to ICMIAM 2022 was delivered by Professor Raghuvir Pai and Professor Harekrishna Misra.
ICMIAM2021 was an excellent example of engagement, collaborations and partnership with a strong support from industries, universities, professional bodies and wider communities. It was a large online gathering for fostering interdisciplinary collaborations. Positive feedback was widely received from delegates, authors, presenters and communities. Conference General Chair, Dr. Gopi Chattopadhyay thanked them for their kind support, encouragements and active participations. Dr Gopi Chattopadhyay concluded the closing session with the message: Good is not good enough in today’s competitive world. This conference has strived for excellence in asset management using systems, technologies, tools and techniques and competent people. In Buddha’s words “There is no wealth like knowledge” and excellence is what matters. He shared his appreciation of all participants that helped in ICMIAM2021 conference to demonstrate this and hoped ICMIAM2022 in India will surpass previous ones.
Photos from the celebration in Ballarat after the ICMIAM2021 conference:
