Geofencing Solutions for Field Operations

//Renewable Energy

Customer Challenge

The Client had partnered with EPC contractors to conduct project operations. EPC’s and third-party contractors avoided or missed scheduled field visits for maintenance and monitoring activities due to an unmonitored environment. The Client had opted to deploy biometric and asset management software to track scheduled visits and activities. However, contractors tweaked the system and sometimes even sent proxies to the field to conduct activities. The Operations team misused the company vehicle under the name of site visits.
All the above resulted in FTAs, failure in fulfillment of SLAs, and undue expenses.
This project was crucial for the Client as mismanagement of visits imposed heavy costs due to maintenance violations which barred warranties of solar plant equipment. Also, the deadlines were tight as new investors wanted to see the capabilities and efficiency of Client’s operations.

i-Source Solution

To address the operational challenge, it was essential to track the movement of vehicles transporting the staff concerned. Maintenance and Inspection personnel needed to be tracked for location, adherence to the route specified and the task to be completed.
i-Source evaluated and selected appropriate geofencing solutions that could integrate with the asset management solution, then integrated a Mobile App for Geofencing and Tracking with a cloud solution.

Technologies deployed

  • Geo tagging hardware for vehicles, inverters, control rooms, and entry gates.
  • Google Cloud Map platform – Map JavaScript API in partnership with Existing Asset management software development team to customize the location tracking system over GPS without internet for mobile phones (Mobile app).
  • SMS server, IOs and Android notification server, SMTP relay server, VPN application gateway server on Azure, Google, Apple, and store
  • Asset management application gateway services for mobile apps on Azure.
  • Enabled mobile app with optic artifacts to get before-after snaps, deployed Azure Blob storage to store the mobile snap in a highly cost-effective manner.
  • Security and Service Management: On-prem exchange replaced with O365 for mailing to reduce on-prem management hassles, replaced the previous set-up with new firewall having better security features.

Business Value Delivered

  • Geofencing integration with asset management software enabled Client to curb unnecessary wastage of fleet, time, and fuel.
  • Provided better visibility into the fleet movement and EPC’s activities by real-time monitoring
  • With the help of granular data on the performance of geofenced areas, Client could further decide the improvement roadmap as well as design new geofenced territories
  • Provided accuracy in scheduling visits of operations engineers to meet the SLAs.