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Applying InfoCenter Suite: Critical environments, energy and research organizations can reap the benefits

Critical Environments and the FDA’s 21 CFR Part 11

One of the most popular applications of InfoCenter Suite ® is to help companies regulated by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) comply with the FDA’s rule for Electronic Records and Electronic Signatures (21 CFR Part 11).

The combination of InfoCenter Suite, Insight ® and the APOGEE ® building automation system provides the most technologically advanced solution to date for 21 CFR Part 11 compliance. This end-to-end solution provides complete management over the entire lifecycle of multiple types of records generated by the APOGEE Automation System.

While InfoCenter Suite 1.5 provides the long-term data management and reporting platform, the other components generate the relevant electronic records and protect their integrity until they are transferred to InfoCenter Suite. The new features of InfoCenter Suite 1.5—including Data Quality (see main article), New Security and Autogrow—— make InfoCenter a practical historian option for APOGEE’s compliance with FDA regulations.

For a pharmaceutical manufacturer, the complete compliance solution also requires validation and extended services. This validation often requires two distinct aspects. First, it is important to ensure that the software is working as designed. Secondly, it is important to ensure that software is applied correctly to support regulatory or compliance requirements.

Tracking energy usage to control costs

High energy prices have created a stronger need to understand where energy is being used and how to reduce consumption—especially in campus environments. One strategy is to sub-meter facility energy loads. Sub- metering provides valuable information in understanding energy usage and load profiles, but it results in large amounts of metering data.

InfoCenter Suite provides an excellent data storage and analysis platform for determining and understanding energy use patterns. It also assists in the complex task of managing the large volume of meter data. InfoCenter Suite 1.5—combined with options such as Utility Cost Manager, OPC client and APOGEE GO for InfoCenter Suite—can provide an effective option to produce centralized, web-based energy reporting. The result: Concise, readable reports that allow facilities managers to track energy usage and make critical decisions.

Colleges and universities: Ensuring top-quality R & D facilities

With state-of-the-art research and development facilities, a college or university can attract top-end students and faculty— and build collaborative programs with private industry. InfoCenter Suite provides fast, easy access to environmental system data to support and validate research studies. Scientists, doctors and technicians are able to focus on their research—not on the time-consuming tasks of retrieving and compiling supporting data.

For more information on the above three examples and more, send an e-mail message and it will be forwarded to your local Siemens Building Technologies office. Please include your full name, job title, name of organization, location and work telephone number.

New InfoCenter Suite 1.5 helps manage facility information, reduce labor costs

Analyze a facility’s energy usage. . . . integrate data from multiple

systems into a centrally managed and secure platform . . . comply with regulatory requirements on everything from electronic signatures to hospital labs. The heavy reporting demands of a facilities manager—regardless of industry— require efficient, cost-effective ways to manage building information.

The solution? InfoCenter Suite® , a software addition to the APOGEE® Building Automation System. It has proven to be a powerful tool to help reduce labor costs in the often labor-intensive task of gathering building information. InfoCenter Suite software gathers, stores and organizes data—enabling facilities managers to generate reports for long-term data analysis. Now, the latest version, InfoCenter Suite 1.5, offers facilities managers more tools than ever—including expanded data reporting features.

Released in November, the version 1.5 allows the APOGEE user to do the following

  • Pinpoint nuisance alarms quickly. The new alarm analysis function combines graphics and statistics to give users a clear picture of where and when their system is generating the greatest number of alarms. Statistic calculations generate the average and maximum alarm durations along with the highest alarm levels reached. Quickly pinpoint problem areas— and then use the alarm summary feature to drill down to specific alarms.
  • Save time with easy-to-read reports. Similar to the Alarm Analysis feature, the new System Activity Analysis feature provides a summary view of system events. Which building level network (BLN) is disconnecting most often? Who is modifying the greatest number of points? Which points are failing? All this information is available in a summarized format.
  • Maintain high-quality data. InfoCenter Suite version 1.5 makes it easy to track data quality and modifications. With the Data Quality and Modification/Annotations reporting functions, a facilities manager can now run a report that will show all the modification/annotations for a group of points over a user-defined time period. This allows users to search all InfoCenter Suite-based information, quickly identifying only poor quality or modified data. What’s more, InfoCenter Suite 1.5 collects a new “quality attribute” from APOGEE Insight ® . This quality attribute is a property of a point’s value and can indicate if it is a “true” value versus a value from data loss or a failed sensor. This quality attribute can be viewed in all applications and included in reports and charts.
  • Perform system installation or recovery with greater ease than before. The InfoCenter Suite solution is now protected by the same license server technologies used by APOGEE Insight. Result: Minimal downtime when performing a system recovery or restore.
  • Improve protection of data. With the Database Autogrow function, InfoCenter Suite 1.5 improves the protection of data. How? By ensuring that full databases don’t create situations in which data could be lost. With InfoCenter Suite 1.5, databases will automatically increase to accommodate the new data until the situation is resolved or available free hard disk space is consumed.
  • Translate the on-screen messages into other languages. Does your organization have international locations, and a need for a global information platform? With Translation and Regional Setting Awareness feature, offices in other countries can deploy a version of InfoCenter Suite in the local language.  Regional Setting awareness and regional settings allow InfoCenter Suite to display numbers, dates and times according to the regional settings selected in Microsoft Windows.
  • Create and view reports from remote locations. InfoCenter Suite 1.5 supports terminal services for all client applications. This allows a more feature-rich remote option than APOGEE GO for InfoCenter Suite. It is tailored to provide access to all client functions from a remote terminal services session.

Base or Advanced: Which version of InfoCenter Suite 1.5 is right for you? (Click the headline to find out)

For more information on how InfoCenter Suite can help you manage building information more efficiently, send an e-mail message and it will be forwarded to your local Siemens Building Technologies office. Please provide your name, job title, name of organization, location, and work telephone number.

 

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