The President of City University of Hong Kong (CityU) had the honour of delivering one of the welcoming speeches at the formal opening of a unique conference on engineering asset management (EAM) and utility management and safety on 30 October at the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre.

 

Professor Way Kuo offered his personal overview of the significance of EAM at the 8th World Congress on Engineering Asset Management (WCEAM) and the 3rd International Conference on Utility Management Safety (ICUMAS), which were held together for the first time.

 

“Engineering asset management is a fascinating and complex area of study, one which incorporates and impacts the economic and technological aspects of all of our lives,’ he said in his address.    

 

Ir Wai Chi-sing, Permanent Secretary for Development (Works) in the HKSAR government, also gave a welcoming address. In addition, Ir Dr Peter Tse Wai-tat, Associate Professor  in the Department of Systems Engineering and Engineering Management (SEEM) at CityU, and the leader of CityU’s Smart Engineering Asset Management Laboratory, acted as Chairman of the Organizing Committee of WCEAM 2103.

 

EAM is required in all industrial sectors from public utilities, transportation and manufacturing to property development, building services, and chemical and power plants. It involves systematic and coordinated activities and practices through which an organisation optimally and sustainably manages its assets and asset systems, their associated performance, risks and expenditures over their life cycles for the purpose of achieving its organisational strategic plan.

 

That is why an understanding and a greater emphasis on EAM were pivotal in making life better for the next generation, Professor Kuo added.

 

He also detailed CityU’s own unique contributions to EAM through its engineering programmes and faculty, pointing out that CityU had the top-ranked engineering department in the greater China region, and was second only in Asia to Tohoku University in Japan.

 

Distinguished CityU academics also gave talks at the conference. Professor Tsui Kwok-leung, Chair Professor Head of SEEM, and Professor Nozer Singpurwalla, Chair Professor of Risk Analysis and Management in the same department, gave keynote speeches. They spoke on statistics research in prognostics and system health management, and quantifying uncertainty in risk analysis, respectively.

 

WCEAM, held annually since 2006, promotes research, development and application in the field of engineering asset management, strengthens links between academic researchers and industrial practitioners in the field, and showcases the state of the art systems and technology in EAM.