There has been a steady growth over the years in the number of companies choosing IntelliPERMIT to help manage operational safety and risk.
We recently spoke to Scott Bredin, Operations Executive at Adapt IT about his views on IntelliPERMIT, and to get insight into what is planned going forward.
Scott has been deeply involved in IntelliPERMIT since the first version, and been a main contributor to excellence in safety by introducing IntelliPERMIT to numerous industrial scale customers worldwide.
Scott, how do you feel about how IntelliPERMIT has grown over the past year?
It has been exciting to see the first deployments of IntelliPERMIT in Canada, the Philippines and Papua New Guinea – from mega-mine construction in the Canadian prairies, to gold plants on equatorial volcanic islands. It speaks to the adaptability of the solution to a wide range of operational environments.
It is also great to see customers adopting the mobile app. Our purpose is to give people the tools to work more safely and efficiently, and giving them the means to securely interact with permits in the field, even when offline, is a significant step forward.
Where are you experiencing the most interest in the IntelliPERMIT solution?
IntelliPERMIT has a great track record in the Australasian mining sector, and we have continued to see strong growth in this market. With Adapt IT offices in Melbourne and Wellington, and our ability to now offer local support from Perth, we are well positioned to extend our offering to more industries in the region.
With strong and sustained growth rates across many resource-rich African countries, this market is strategic for us – especially as the continent grows its industrial base to beneficiate these resources.
We also see significant opportunities in North America. This is obviously a mature market. However, only a relatively small proportion of operations have invested in digitisation of the permit to work process.
What are the typical challenges that clients are facing with regards safety and their permit process?
Our experience is that while there are certainly some common themes, these vary considerably by industry and geography. For example, an important function of the permit process is to ensure that all participants are trained, competent and authorised for the work. Some operations have large contractor workforces to be managed in complex, short duration maintenance shutdowns; others face handover challenges with fly-in, fly-out personnel.
How does the permit to work fit into the overall area of operational risk management?
Operational Risk Management is all about ensuring that risks are identified, assessed, and eliminated or mitigated – and that this process is properly monitored and performance effectively measured. In industrial environments the permit to work is core to implementing effective risk management. It is a crucial interface between production, engineering and maintenance disciplines.
Where is the current focus in product development?
We increasingly view our product as a platform. This means that it provides an array of specialised services that can be combined in many ways (that we cannot always predict), and are interoperable with other technologies. That sounds horribly abstract! In practice, this means closely examining what people need in a particular operation, and using the components of IntelliPERMIT to rapidly configure a solution that fits like a glove.
We are investing heavily in the overall user experience: not only giving the software a fresh look, but attending to a myriad of small details that just make it nicer to use. We are also working hard on new ways to visualise work in planning and execution.
Are you able to mention any new partnerships and the opportunities these provide your customers?
We have partnered with IsoBuilder to provide customers with integrated isolation design using P&ID’s. This is a significant improvement on manually marked-up isolation diagrams.
The technology complements IntelliPERMIT and is well aligned to our strategy to enhance the user experience with visual tools.
You have some great enterprise customers, how can prospective customers get in contact to learn from these experiences?
The easiest method is to contact us via www.intellipermit.com
Where to next in terms of product development?
Our roadmap is structured to first protect the investment that customers have made in IntelliPERMIT by supporting the latest server platforms, browsers and so on. We then look at features in demand.
We see growing interest in technologies to enhance the process of identifying and verifying isolation points in the field using RFID tags or QR codes.
The ability to better manage routine tasks that are pre-approved is also something we are working on – as are tools to improve permit office throughput.
Thank you Scott. Do you have any thing to add?
The prototype of IntelliPERMIT went live in 1998. We are deeply indebted to the many people who have contributed to its success since then, not the least of whom are our customers who have funded the development of the product, and just as importantly, contributed with their ideas and encouragement.
If you have any comments or suggestions about this article, or would like to contact the IntelliPERMIT team at Adapt IT please let us know by contacting us.
