Building Asset Management System

Abstract

A connected services system manages assets of building management systems of different organizations. An application server collects information from the assets, which is stored in various data stores associated with an account of the client organization, including an asset store, a group hierarchy store, a user account store, an asset ownership store, and a group ownership store. The group hierarchy store organizes the assets into tiered groups such as campuses, buildings, floors and wings. Users view, on graphical interfaces displayed on the displays of user devices, information from the asset store pertaining to assets that are owned by or shared with them according to the group ownership and asset ownership stores. The graphical interfaces include an asset panel for displaying detailed information about assets, a grouping selector, for filtering which assets for which information is displayed, and a status graphic for providing information concerning the status of the assets.

What is claimed is: 
     
         1 . A system for managing assets of building management systems, the system comprising:
 an asset store for storing information concerning the assets of the building management systems;   a user account store for storing information concerning user accounts; and   an ownership store for enabling access by the user accounts in the user account store to the information in the asset store.   
     
     
         2 . The system as claimed in  claim 1 , wherein the ownership store enables access by designating user accounts from the user account store as owners of assets represented in the asset store. 
     
     
         3 . The system as claimed in  claim 1 , wherein the ownership store enables access by designating which user accounts with which information about assets represented in the asset store is shared. 
     
     
         4 . The system as claimed in  claim 3 , wherein the ownership store further designates specific types of information to be shared with the user accounts. 
     
     
         5 . The system as claimed in  claim 1 , further comprising a group hierarchy store for storing groups for the assets. 
     
     
         6 . The system as claimed in  claim 5 , wherein the groups are ordered in a tree structure. 
     
     
         7 . The system as claimed in  claim 5 , wherein the groups have owners, and the groups can be shared with other users. 
     
     
         8 . The system as claimed in  claim 1 , wherein the assets include fire panels and intrusion panels. 
     
     
         9 . The system as claimed in  claim 1 , further comprising sets of asset stores, user account stores and ownership stores being maintained for different organizations. 
     
     
         10 . A method for managing assets of building management systems, the method comprising:
 an asset store storing information concerning the assets of the building management systems;   a user account store information concerning storing user accounts; and   an ownership store enabling access by the user accounts in the user account store to the information in the asset store.   
     
     
         11 . The method as claimed in  claim 10 , further comprising the ownership store enabling access by designating user accounts from the user account store as owners of assets represented in the asset store. 
     
     
         12 . The method as claimed in  claim 10 , further comprising the ownership store enabling access by designating which user accounts with which information about assets represented in the asset store is shared. 
     
     
         13 . The method as claimed in  claim 12 , further comprising the ownership store designating specific types of information to be shared with the user accounts. 
     
     
         14 . The method as claimed in  claim 10 , further comprising group hierarchy stores storing groups for the assets. 
     
     
         15 . The method as claimed in  claim 14 , wherein the groups are ordered in a tree structure. 
     
     
         16 . The method as claimed in  claim 14 , wherein the groups have owners, and the groups can be shared with other users. 
     
     
         17 . A system for managing assets of building management systems, the system comprising:
 an asset store for storing information concerning the assets of the building management systems;   a user account store for storing information concerning user accounts;   an ownership store, for enabling access by the user accounts in the user account store to the information in the asset store; and   a custom name store for allowing each of the users to store a custom name for assets that are owned by or shared with the users.   
     
     
         18 . A method for managing assets of building management systems, the method comprising:
 an asset store storing information concerning the assets of the building management systems;   a user account store information concerning storing user accounts; and   an ownership store enabling access by the user accounts in the user account store to the information in the asset store; and   a custom name store storing custom names assigned by the users for assets that are owned by or shared with the users.   
     
     
         19 . A system for managing assets of building management systems, the system comprising:
 an asset manager including an asset store for storing information concerning the assets of the building management systems, a user account store for storing information concerning user accounts, and an ownership store, for enabling access by the user accounts in the user account store to the information in the asset store;   a user device displaying a graphic user interface including names of assets and an ownership status of the assets as being owned or shared.   
     
     
         20 . A method for managing assets of building management systems, the method comprising:
 storing information concerning the assets of the building management systems;   storing information concerning user accounts; and   enabling access users to the information in the asset store and showing the users names of assets and ownership statuses of the assets as being owned or shared.