Pharmaceutical · Industrial Data Infrastructure

PI System Upgrade

A shutdown-critical PI System upgrade delivered on modern infrastructure with no data loss and full validation before production resumed.

ClientIrish pharmaceutical manufacturing site

LocationIreland

DisciplineIndustrial Data Infrastructure

Data loss

9 hrs

Data unavailable

2 weeks

Shutdown window

50+

Interfaces protected

Project profile

Outcome-led engineering

A shutdown-critical PI System upgrade delivered on modern infrastructure with no data loss and full validation before production resumed.

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The challenge

The site’s PI System supported batch release through RtReports, but the platform was running on outdated software, hardware and operating systems. The complete upgrade had to fit within a two-week plant shutdown.

More than 50 OPC DA, RDBMS, FTBatch and other interfaces were feeding the system. Their configuration had to remain unchanged because even a small edit would trigger documentation updates and revalidation. Data also remained operationally important during the shutdown, so the plan had to protect every record while keeping unavailability below 24 hours.

The solution

Réalta used a multi-phase plan covering preparation, execution and validation. The team planned backwards from the shutdown, migrated legacy configuration documents in advance and created a detailed cutover schedule with contingency time and stakeholder approvals.

New servers were built with temporary identities, then assumed the original server names and IP addresses during cutover. Interfaces buffered data while the PI servers were offline and automatically recognised the replacement environment when it came online. This protected existing interface, display and application configurations.

Cutover and validation

Teams in Ireland and Canada extended execution coverage across time zones. A central communication hub coordinated daily activity, risk and validation decisions. The team verified interface buffering, restored the Data Archive and PIFD database, upgraded the software, checked every interface instance and confirmed that all buffered data reached the new system.

The Primary and Secondary Data Archives, AF Server, Event Frames Generator and RtReports Server were validated before the shutdown ended.

Results

The project met the shutdown and validation deadlines with zero data loss. Data was unavailable for nine hours, well inside the 24-hour target. The site returned to production with a fully validated PI System running current software, hardware and operating systems.

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