This document defines basic concepts for asset management used in an OPC UA Information Model. It considers different aspects of asset management. Applications do not have to use all or nothing of this specification, but can chose which concepts they want to support. In some cases, this specification just defines how to use concepts of the base OPC UA specifications, in other cases it does define additional OPC UA Nodes (types or standardized instances).

The intention of this specification is to define commonalities on asset management, that can be used as base from other companion specifications which might further refine those concepts for their domain specific needs. However, it is also possible to use this specification directly, without additional companion specifications.

OPC Foundation

OPC is the interoperability standard for the secure and reliable exchange of data and information in the industrial automation space and in other industries. It is platform independent and ensures the seamless flow of information among devices from multiple vendors. The OPC Foundation is responsible for the development and maintenance of this standard.

OPC UA is a platform independent service-oriented architecture that integrates all the functionality of the individual OPC Classic specifications into one extensible framework. This multi-layered approach accomplishes the original design specification goals of:

• Platform independence: from an embedded microcontroller to cloud-based infrastructure
• Secure: encryption, authentication, authorisation and auditing
• Extensible: ability to add new features including transports without affecting existing applications
• Comprehensive information modelling capabilities: for defining any model from simple to complex