Having clear information of the technical integrity of the network is state of the art from an operator’s point of view. Therefore PIMS is essential for future management issues. Competitive business in a liberalised market will need a complete and detailed view to manage a complex processes, like rehabilitation- and maintenance activities. A primary goal for pipeline operators is the optimization of the rehabilitation and maintenance strategy of pipelines or facilities. The strategic use of pipelines is based on a risk management analysis.

A pipeline operator has to deal with several operational obligations on a daily basis. These operational duties could be either one time activities, e.g. answering dig requests, event-triggered or planned repair task, or recurring activities like time-triggered maintenance, pipeline patrolling or CP measurements.

Tasks like pipeline rehabilitation, maintenance or answering dig requests can be supported using software applications. It is possible to identify needs of action by looking at financial ratios in the context of an efficiency analysis and by looking at technical data using a technical condition analysis. Financial ratios can be calculated on the basis of cost development for maintenance and repair on pipelines and facilities compared to their actual maximum flow rate, age and other parameters.

From this point of view, PIMS and Network Asset Management (NAM) are the central elements in the continuous business lifecycle of a pipeline infrastructure. GEOMAGIC developed a web-based software application with generic functionality to support this variety of operational obligations. Furthermore the web application is tightly integrated with GIS for tight integration of geographical and technical asset data.

The experiences gathered in several customers projects will be presented in the paper.