Siemens state-of-the-art, $20 million Perth Service Centre in Western Australia (WA) is open for business. The centre was opened recently with Siemens’ industrial businesses head of customer service Dr Thomas Moser among the guests.

He said the centre “heralds a new era for hi-tech service. Industries such as mining and oil & gas that have made significant capital investments are now challenged with falling resource prices. At the same time the world is entering a new industrial era enabled by digitalisation.

“Now more than ever, it’s critical for companies to embrace hi-tech service to produce more at lower costs and avoid downtime that can cause losses and negatively impact company share prices. That’s why Siemens is pleased to be making this $20 million investment in WA,” he said.

“It’s about being competitive to secure your place in the global supply chain. Through modern technology and services, companies can achieve operational efficiencies, extend the life of their assets, optimise performance, reduce energy consumption and protect investments. Remote monitoring, predictive maintenance, simulation and cloud based asset management are just some of the new technologies and practises that operators can utilise.”

The Perth Service Centre is the third new Siemens Service Centre in Australia in less than two years after Tonsley in South Australia and Rockhampton in Queensland.

“Operational phases represent about 95% of the lifecycle costs – compared to just 5% or less in the capital investment phase, so hi-tech service becomes critical to drive increased overall equipment effectiveness while reducing these operational costs. For example, in Turkey’s state-run Tüpras refinery

Siemens succeeded in reducing the downtime of 1500 motors by a staggering 83%,” said Dr Thomas Moser.

The new Perth centre features end-to-end service capabilities, including:

• Ability to service motors, generators and variable speed drives in strict accordance with OEM standards;
• A $5 million specialised test-bed for electric motors with a load test facility which means that any of the motors being overhauled can be fully simulated to run as in installed conditions. This is the most sophisticated test bed of its kind in Australia and can test the widest breadth of motors under load for its size;
• A remote service hub that serves as a location for experts to monitor equipment and key plant anywhere in Australia with the ability to remotely connect to equipment and perform trouble shooting and reactive services, as well as support condition based maintenance strategies. The hub will utilise cloud based data analytics to optimise performance of plant and equipment;
• Hub from which to mobilise field service engineers; and
• 20 tonne balancing machine – ensures shafts and rotors can be precision balanced before returning to the field, ensuring less wear and tear and more efficient operations.

The WA Department of Mines and Petroleum notes the value of resource projects under construction or in the committed stage is estimated at $171 billion and a further $110 billion is planned for the coming years. Siemens Australia CEO Jeff Connolly said the timing of the opening perfectly supported critical projects as they transitioned into operations such as Chevron’s Gorgon where the first LNG production was expected within the next few weeks.

“As the main motors and drives contractor for important infrastructure projects including some of WA’s biggest LNG projects, we take a long term view to the market and understand the importance of being there to support our customers over the operational life of the project as well,” he said. “Rapid developments in digitalisation mean that the future of service equates to the future of competition. Almost every modern piece of equipment now has the ability to capture data – it’s what you do with that data that matters!”