Keywords: facilities asset management, information technology, building information modelling, geographic information system.

Widely-dispersed assets such as facilities, equipment, roads, bridges and pipe networks present local governments as well as large organizations with a number of asset management challenges. Financial sustainability and competitive pressures force local governments and organizations to minimize asset total cost of ownership and streamline their asset management operations. The implementation of information technology could lead to better deployment of service and maintenance resources for work on the right asset at the correct location therefore reduces costly maintenance mistakes, and increases the quality of service.

In particular, substantial benefits can be achieved through the implementation of a geographic information system (GIS) that is integrated with an asset management system. By spatially enabling the representation of the entire infrastructure in map-based views, and by utilizing tools to analyse spatial relationships, tremendous improvements in efficiency, cost containment, and better decision-making can be realized. On the other hand, building information modelling (BIM) can bring great benefits to large scale asset management as the availability of high level objects and detailed information about particular building components will provide valuable information to facilitate asset management functions for example, analysing routes for inspection and maintenance works.

This paper provides a state-of-the-art review of the use of BIM and GIS in facilities asset management. The main objective of the paper is to provide a critical review of some previous developments in the area and to identify aspects where further research and development are needed. The paper firstly elaborates the main functionalities of an asset management system, which are then mapped out with the strengths of GIS and BIM. This is then followed with a critical explanation of the completed case study developments for large scale asset management. Finally based on the experience and lessons learnt from those case study developments, the paper argues the issues and challenges related to integration between GIS and BIM and then it concludes with a brief vision and recommendation for further research and development on GIS and BIM implementation for asset management.

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