The Differences Between APM, EAM, and CMMS and What you Really Need

John Todd, Sr. Business Consultant/Product Researcher, Total Resource Management (TRM)

Posted 2/27/2025

What are the differences between APM, EAM, and CMMS?

Ah, acronyms. A method of speaking volumes with just a few letters and yet generating confusion all at the same time. As you search the Internet for information about these tools of the trade, you may find any of these acronyms being used consistently, but the elements of and meanings behind may vary widely. If you have been in this industry for a while, you may have seen a procession of acronyms, each of which builds upon the previous.

As an organization, you might be following the Define, Measure, Analyze, Improve, Control methodology or being asked to investigate ISO 55000 registration, both of which point to the need for a comprehensive set of software tools to organize your maintenance efforts. You might be in an FDA regulated environment that requires traceability, configuration management and control.

No matter your situation, managing assets has long ago moved away from simply performing your maintenance tasks and hoping for the best. It is now a professionally recognized and key operational competency for large and small organizations.

Let’s get right to it. Here are the differences between APM, EAM, and CMMS, starting with definitions…

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Asset Performance Management (APM)

The methodology, software tools, and techniques used to capture, understand, and make decisions about the performance of the assets under your control. While some “Asset Management” tools may have a degree of analysis functions built-in, most do not. This leaves you with establishing your own eclectic collection of data analysis tools, each with their own approach to your needs. APM would include:

Equipment condition monitoring via sensor and inspection technologies (vibration, temperature, infrared, oil analysis, alert telemetry), integrated with the maintenance system.
Predictive analytics (data science models, machine learning, artificial intelligence) for potential failure prevention/reduction and anomaly detection, using real-time data directly from equipment monitoring systems.
The use of machine learning and artificial intelligence for equipment health scoring and maintenance (corrective, preventive, inventory, planning and scheduling) optimization.
Analysis of raw equipment performance data perhaps leading to the use of classical Reliability/Availability/Maintainability (RAM) calculations and statistical techniques
Definition, care, and feeding of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and other metrics sets for decision making (Good data in… Good decisions made)
Feedback into the Maintenance organization, based on all this real data, potential adjustments, or opportunities to the maintenance approach for the asset set.
Feedback to the financial side of the organization as to asset lifecycle costs for further decision making.
Input to corporate risk management and other strategic planning areas
Answer questions such as:
- “What are the true costs of maintaining these assets?”
- “How are the assets performing based upon what our expectations were?”
- “When an asset does fail us, what are those costs?”
- “How certain are we with the data we are capturing about our assets?”
- Compare asset types and configurations.

When it comes to understanding asset performance, drawing upon the time-tested methods of the Reliability Engineering world can be enlightening. Created because of the dismal performance of “assets,” during World War II, these statistical techniques have proven themselves to be excellent indicators and guides as to how assets are performing in their context. The key to their success is “good” data to draw upon… of which your asset management tool and your staff are crucial factors to that end.

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Enterprise Asset Management (EAM)

A software tool or suite of tools used to manage the assets under your control during their lifecycle and execute maintenance activities. May include purchasing, inventory, contracting, warranty, and other business process elements, providing an enterprise view. Suited for organizations looking to consolidate tools or integrate with other parts of the business.

Many business elements supported in a single tool
Is heavily focused on assets, while being flexible to tailor for your unique business processes
Provides a single point of access to a wide variety of users (Managers, Staff, Planners, Purchasing, Warehouse, Executives, etc.), delivering to them the information they are interested in and responsible for
Greatly assists an organization in moving up in the levels of maintenance maturity. From reactionary, to preventive, and finally to predictive.
May have support for “self-service” portals via of which users across the enterprise can submit requests for work to be performed, or items to be ordered. May also have a “solution database,” function that is searchable by users prior to submitting a “ticket.”
Have built-in communication paths and workflow functions for the disparate business functions to communication within the tool, negating the need for emails, hard copies, etc.
Can include a degree of data analysis and visualization functionality (That which is measured, improves) Assists in optimizing asset performance to maximize revenue.
May have a built-in set of reports that covers most needs, and/or an “ad-hoc” report function that enables users to create their own basic reports.
May have built-in data import/export functionality to different levels of detail and control. A very handy feature if you are migrating from another system, or plan on interfacing with other business or technical systems.
Are highly configurable to suit the needs of any organization. Can be a little difficult to use right out of the box.
Answer questions such as:
- The same list as APM, plus
- “How efficient is our Maintenance function?”
- “How effective is our planning?”
- “What is our ratio between corrective and preventive maintenance activities?”
- “What is our cost to inventory our spare parts and other tools needed for maintenance?”

In years past, EAM-level asset management software suites such as SAP and IBM Maximo were considered for use only in very large, IT savvy, and geographically spread organizations. However, with the advent of cloud hosted solutions such as Software as a Service (SaaS) and other methods, many of the barriers to smaller organizations having enterprise level tools have been removed.

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Computerized Maintenance Management System (CMMS)

A tool or suite of tools focused on the management of maintenance activities. Might be narrowly focused on maintenance activities vs. a wider range of features/functions. A rather old term now as it is from the days of replacing paper with fancy new computer-based systems. They can have a smaller “footprint,” as a typical EAM suite.

Focused on the day-to-day maintenance work and increasing work efficiency, reducing costs.
Use the concept of a “work order,” to identify and execute maintenance work.
May have limited configuration and customization ability. You generally must use these, “as-is.” Can be a little, “niche-y,” and might not grow well with you.
Can be functionally as robust as the work management elements of an EAM system but may not be supportive of other business process areas.
Answer questions such as:
- “How many hours do we spend on performing maintenance?”
- “What are our, “worst actors,” assets?”

With the focus of these systems on “maintenance” they may lack the interconnections to other business processes such as inventory, purchasing, and asset management. An error that organizations often make is to allow a specific department or area to proceed with the purchase of a software tool that is only for their needs. Rather, the organization should cast a wider net and seek a tool that may benefit more than just one area. While perhaps more costly up front, in the end the gains in efficiency of the interconnection across disciplines may be worth it.

Management – The Common Thread

Whether you agree 100% with these definitions or not, the one thing that is clear is that these systems/approaches are focused on management – Assets, work, tools, people, data collection, supplies, processes… everything related to the work and maintenance of equipment.

Manage:

Performance – data capture, analysis, and reporting
Costs, movement, responsibility
Work performed, skills required, contractors used

One cannot manage something if you do not have information about it to make decisions with. Turning raw data into information that can then be used to make decisions is a crucial skill of any organization. No matter the label you place on the tool(s) you are using, this is your overall goal: Capture good data that management can use to make good decisions with.

One element that assists in managing the assets is having work processes with built-in data capture points of which support analysis and decision making. Every day that goes by where data is not collected is lost forever. Capturing tactical data on the assets and the work surrounding them is easily turned into valuable information for all levels of management to use in near and future planning.

A significant portion of managing assets is the management of the people who look after them. By providing an efficient “role-based,” presentation of the work at hand to staff, these tools facilitate efficiency and user adoption of processes and compliance. By focusing down to a singular entry point or tool for staff vs. multiple tools with different philosophies and navigation, administrative time can be drastically reduced.

Planning work can range from quite simple to very complex. Modern assets and production operations have numerous interconnected elements and systems, all of which must be considered before work begins. EAM tools in particular have built-in scheduling and planning tools that are capable of visualizing all of these elements and actually publish out to the work force the daily, weekly, months, annual plan. As an emergency break in work appears, plans can be adjusted and re-published. There should be no guessing as far as what the plan is for the day when your staff arrives for their shift.

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Which tool is right for you? The Differences Between APM, EAM, and CMMS

Forget for a moment all these labels and focus on your needs… your business requirements. What is the list of things that you need to be able to continue to do, and what is it you wish to accomplish in the future? Armed with a good list you can go shopping.

Save yourself some time… and money… by having a well-researched list in hand before you approach a supplier of these tools. In fact, hand your list to the supplier and ask them to demonstrate each item in their offering.

What are your requirements? Try this list out for size. (Feel free to use this list to check the box on the requirements that stand out to you. Then, whether you are looking at an APM, EAM, or CMMS solution, ask if the solution has your checked requirements!)

Maintenance and work management
1. Work Identification, planning/scheduling, prioritizing, execution
2. Workflow automation
3. Coordination/communication to other business processes
4. Distinction between Preventive, Predictive, Corrective, Administrative activities
Asset lifecycle management
1. Commissioning of new assets
2. Tracking asset work, movement, and ownership
3. Classification and specification of assets tracking/definition
4. Failure reporting and analysis
Data capture and analysis (costs, downtime, failures, etc.)
1. Establishment of required fields and quality assurance during work order data entry
2. Visualization of results and tactical data
Inventory/Purchasing
1. End to end purchase of new items
2. Receiving, Issues, transfers, returns of inventory items
3. Management and organization of inventory locations
4. Coordination of inventory availability for work activities
5. Contracts to procure items
6. Multiple Vendors for sourcing
7. Reordering, economic order quantities
8. Requests for quotes
9. Invoice management
Reporting
1. Built-in/pre-built
2. Ad-hoc (as needed, User created)
3. Simple downloads of data result sets
Support for decision making
1. Extract/interface data to decision systems
Configurable or pre-built dashboards, work visualizations/flows, seamless communication
1. Workflows to shepherd records through the process
2. Automation to ensure data integrity
Interconnection with other business systems/processes (ERP, Procurement, Contracts, Accounting, Inventory)
1. Interface tables
2. Web Services/API
3. Flat-file, batch loading
Historical records
1. Indication of, editing controls, preservation of
Regulatory and legal audit trails
1. Focused auditing functionality
2. Electronic signatures
Pictures and other file attachments
1. In preparation for work
2. Inspection results
3. Purchasing information
Warranty tracking
1. Current active warranty contracts and equipment under purview
2. Tracking/capture of warranty work for reimbursement
Use of contractors to perform work
1. Contracts
2. Assignment
3. Work details capture
Safety
1. Establishment of asset and/or location specific safety issues and precautions
2. Staff protective equipment specification
Preventive vs. Predictive vs. Corrective
3D/BIM visualization of facilities and asset/work locations
Security
1. User access methods (native, LDAP, CAC card/SAML)
2. User authority to perform functions within tool(s)
3. User role establishment
Mobile opportunities and requirements (replace paper, go mobile)
Machine Learning / Artificial Intelligence to support business decisions and to automate repetitive actions

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Wrap up – The Differences Between APM, EAM, and CMMS

As you search for a tool or suite of tools to enhance the efficiency of asset and work management within your organization, you will find many different approaches… and many different acronyms. Each has its own value proposition and potential for return on investment. In the end, the solution you choose must perform better and provide returns greater than your current system.

Making the move from paper to plastic must make sense.

Whether a large or small concern, the tools you seek must meet your requirements. Some may include far more functions than your organization could ever use. Others may be too narrow and not interface with your other business systems. Spending time up front capturing your specific business requirements will go a long way to ensuring that the tool set you choose in the end will serve you for many years.

The Differences Between APM, EAM, and CMMS and What you Really Need originally published by Total Resource Management

John Q. Todd

John Q. Todd has nearly 30 years of business and technical experience in the Project Management, Process development/improvement, Quality/ISO/CMMI Management, Technical Training, Reliability Engineering, Maintenance, Application development, Risk Management, & Enterprise Asset Management fields. His experience includes work as a Reliability Engineer & RCM implementer for NASA/JPL Deep Space Network, as well as numerous customer projects and consulting activities as a reliability and spares analysis expert. He is a Sr. Business Consultant and Product Researcher with Total Resource Management, an an IBM Gold Business Partner – focused on the market-leading EAM solution, Maximo, specializes in improving asset and operational performance by delivering strategic consulting services with world class functional and technical expertise.

Too Small for a CMMS? Think Again

Many smaller companies feel maintenance management software is overkill for their organizations. Nothing could be further from the truth. In reality, even a one-person maintenance department can reap the benefits of maintenance management software. The same benefits realized by the maintenance crew in larger companies are there for smaller maintenance departments also.

The Role of Information Technology in Plant Reliability

Information technologies (IT), in the context of this paper, include all computer systems and networks, plant automation systems such as distributed control systems and programmable logic controllers, design drawing databases, procedures databases, and diagnostic monitoring systems. The role of information technology is critical for maintenance optimization because it relies on the ability of the plant personnel to bring all data together in a coherent fashion for optimum analysis and decision-making.

The Future of CMMS

We now have the ability to automate many of our standard maintenance processes, analyse in detail various parts of our businesses, and the performance of our equipment. We are able to plan shutdowns, technical change projects and operational maintenance procedures down to a very fine level of detail. As maintenance management generally makes up around 40 - 50 % of operational budgets, the savings made possible from increased efficiency and reduction of waste are staggering.

The 8 Key Elements to Look for in Maintenance Software

Facility management personnel in all industries have waited a long time for computer technology to become applicable and affordable enough to implement in their respective maintenance efforts. In recent years, flexible, dependable and economical computerized maintenance management systems (CMMS) have become available to help fight the never-ending struggle to operate and maintain buildings of all shapes, sizes and functions.

The Differences Between APM, EAM, and CMMS and What you Really Need