Meralco Unveils AI-Powered Command Control Center

The Manila Electric Company (Meralco) has unveiled an AI-powered command control center that will reduce unplanned downtime of critical ICT systems, raise employees; productivity, and bolster service delivery to its customers.

Photo Insert: Meralco's OPTIC

Dubbed OPTIC or Operations Platform and Telecommunications Integrated Command Center (OPTIC), the command center is the first of its kind in the country among distribution utilities and will be manned by highly skilled ICT engineers.

OPTIC provides a centralized monitoring system that allows faster fault detection and restoration of technology services. The underlying platform is powered by Artificial Intelligence (AI) that analyzes all systems logs, provides actionable information and insights, and enables predictive and proactive maintenance.

With the pandemic encouraging millions of Meralco customers to rely on digital touchpoints, the OPTIC improves the distribution utility’s resiliency and service reliability by providing real-time application, IT network, and communication link outage alerts to support teams to immediately restore these services.

“The new OPTIC is an intelligent communications and response coordination platform that covers and serves all our facilities, operations, and people. This platform plays a pivotal role in the effective management of Meralco’s daily operations, resulting in higher efficiency, improved incidents mitigation and response capabilities which translate to consistent and reliable services to our customers and workforce," according to Meralco Vice President and Head of Information Communication Technology and Transformation Rocky D. Bacani.

Meralco President and Chief Executive Officer Atty. Ray C. Espinosa highlighted that the platform serves as an “essential foundation in achieving Meralco’s goal of becoming smarter and innately digital”.

“Meralco’s OPTIC revolutionizes the way data is harnessed and used to closely monitor our mission-critical systems in real-time, proactively identify and address issues, make intelligent operational and business decisions, and eliminate barriers to heighten collaboration. We are excited as the launch of the command center lays the groundwork upon which we will expand technologies and enable more innovations, ultimately leading to excellent service to delight our customers,” Espinosa added.

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