AUTHOR ARCHIVES: Field Service News

In this excerpt from an exclusive fieldservicenews.com webcast Scott Flatman, Regional Sales Director, Salesforce about how technology is enabling field service companies to bridge the gap between their customers and the mobile workforce.

 

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Kris Oldland, Editor-in-Chief, Field Service News talks to nick Frank, Founding Partner, Si2 Partners, about some of the key findings of a recent research project recently undertaken by the two companies that explored emerging trends in the recruitment and development of both field service engineers as well as service managers across a wide range of industry verticals.

 

Find more from Nick Frank @ Si2Partners

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If there is one industry that should be leveraging data in every way possible, it’s telecommunications. The telecommunications industry services billions of people each day, generating massive amounts of data. Though not many telecom companies are leveraging this data, the introduction of data science, machine learning, and artificial intelligence in this industry are inevitable.

A study by McKinsey, Telcos: The Untapped Promise of Big Data, based on a survey of leaders from 273 telecom organizations, found that most companies had not yet seriously leveraged the data at their disposal to increase profits. And only 30 per cent say they have already made investments in big data.

So while there is certainly debate within telecom companies about whether the return on investment is worthwhile, there is no doubt that data science, machine learning (ML), and artificial intelligence (AI) are inevitable when it comes to the industry’s future. Those that figure out how to leverage these techniques and technologies will thrive; those that don’t will be left behind.

By using data science, machine learning, and artificial intelligence strategies, telecommunication companies can improve four areas of their services.

The importance of data science, ML, and AI to the telecom industry will likely present itself in these four areas in particular, which this paper will take a look at individually:

 

1. Troubleshooting:

One of the major challenges for telecom providers is being able to guarantee quality service to subscribers. Analyzing call detail records (CDR) generated by subscribers at any given moment of the day is key to troubleshooting. However, CDRs are challenging to work with because the volume of data gets massive and unwieldy quickly. For example, the largest telecommunication companies can collect six billion CDRs per day.

With data science, machine learning (ML), and artificial intelligence (AI), companies can instantaneously parse through millions of CDRs in real-time, identify patterns, create scalable data visualizations, and predict future problems.

 

2. Fraud Detection: 

Verizon estimated in 2014 that fraud costs the telecom industry upwards of $4 billion a year. However, the faster that telecom companies analyze large amounts of data, the better off they are in identifying suspicious call patterns that correlate with fraudulent activity.

Cutting-edge ML and AI strategies like advanced anomaly detection make it much easier for telecommunication companies to identify “true party” fraud quickly.

 

3. Marketing:

The high churn rate in telecommunications, estimated at between 20-40% annually, is the greatest challenge for telecom companies. Telecommunication companies can use data to build better profiles of customers, figure out how to best win their loyalty (in the most scalable and automated way), and adequately allocate a marketing budget. With improved data architecture, they are able to harvest and store a greater diversity of data that provide insights into each customer such as demographics, location, devices used, the frequency of purchases, and usage patterns. By combining data from other sources like social media, they can have a stronger understanding of their customers.

Using machine learning gives a more accurate picture of which channels are most responsible for customer conversions for better ad buying as well.

 

4. Customer Experience: 

Telecommunication companies can enhance their services by analyzing the millions of customer complaints they get every year to figure out which types of improvements will have the greatest impact on customer satisfaction and thereby increase customer retention. They can also leverage data at a larger and more automated scale to gain insights into the performance of their technicians.

The more that telecommunication companies can analyze data on customer calls, the more they can begin to recognize which types of problems are most likely to lead to unwarranted “truck rolls” and put in place measures to prevent those calls. Given the number of calls and the depth of analysis required, this necessarily dictates a machine learning approach - more specifically, a deep learning approach. Because analyzing the calls themselves means dealing with lots of unstructured data, it’s the perfect place to expand into ML and deep learning for big gains.

 

The future of data in the telecom industry

Data science is already a big part of the telecommunications industry, and as big data tools become more available and sophisticated, data science, ML, and AI will all continue to grow in this space.

In the coming years, companies that succeed will be those that figure out how to best use the massive number of data points that are flowing both through their network and around it to reduce labor costs, develop better technology and, to better understand what the seven billion potential customers around the world want to do with their smartphones and computers.

To learn more, download the whitepaper White Paper: Top 4 Growth Areas of Machine Learning in Telecommunications.

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All companies within the Kinaxia Logistics Group have had TruTac software installed to ensure that the Group is operating safely and efficiently, whilst being fully compliant with regulations.

Kinaxia employs a dedicated team of compliance professionals to manage the Group fleet, which comprises of over 630 vehicles, therefore it is essential for the team to have full visibility of compliance data across all of the companies. In need of a modern, flexible compliance analytics software that can provide comprehensive reporting, Kinaxia chose to work with leading tachograph analysis software and compliance products provider, TruTac.

Utilising the TruTac product, TruView, the Kinaxia compliance team has access to a full compliance dashboard that provides data from across the Group in one central place. It offers all-around compliance control; tachograph management, driver de-briefing and compliance reporting.

By effectively monitoring, reviewing and managing driving performance, Kinaxia works to ensure that the companies within the Group are compliant with legislation and are operating in a safe, efficient manner.

Responsible for the roll-out of TruTac across the Kinaxia Logistics group, Trevor Dickenson, Group Health Safety and Compliance Manager, says “TruTac is a clear and concise way for us to ensure we document and review our Drivers’ behaviour. It gives us full visibility across the Group and keeps our drivers and others safe on the roads.”

“With real-time, easy access to accurate information and the ability to pull a range of the reports, we are able to work with our Drivers to get a full understanding of their needs and any risks or issues that we can tackle. The TruTac system is a great addition to our Group.” added Trevor.

Kinaxia Logistics is currently looking at additional TruTac products that may help to support compliance and operations, such as TruCheck, an app for driver vehicle checks, which is currently being trialled at Mark Thompson Transport.

 

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Healthcare Estates 2018 is a two-day event consisting of the UK’s largest trade exhibition for the healthcare sector, the prestigious IHEEM (Institute of Healthcare Engineering & Estate Management) Annual Conference, and the Healthcare Estates IHEEM Awards Dinner. It will take place on 9th and 10th October 2018 at Manchester Central.

Asolvi will be exhibiting at the event on stand Bz2, focusing on its longest-running service management solution, Tesseract. A market favourite since 1985, Tesseract continues to optimise the service chains of thousands of field service organisations all over Europe.

At the exhibition, the Asolvi team will be on hand to discuss and demonstrate the benefits of Tesseract in the context of the healthcare sector. The software is currently used by a number of medical facilities & equipment providers to manage and maintain thousands of life-saving devices in hospitals and health centres, everything from ventilators to defibrillators to ultrasound machines.

Cited by healthcare professionals as one of the most important events of the year, Healthcare Estates has been running for 60 years and attracts over 3,000 delegates and visitors.

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Epson, providers of the Moverio® augmented reality (AR) smart glasses platform, today announced both the availability of the new Moverio BT-350 ANSI Edition smart glasses and the release of the Upskill® Skylight® AR platform on Moverio...

The availability of Upskill’s award-winning software with the new BT-350 ANSI Edition allows the Moverio platform to be used in a variety of commercial environments, with the goal of driving greater worldwide adoption of the technology.

Skylight, Upskill’s AR software platform interface allows hands-on workers to get the job done faster and more accurately by connecting them to the people, information and equipment they need while remaining hands-free to focus on their tasks and their tools.

“Epson was one of the first companies to see the value of smart glasses in the enterprise and their Moverio hardware is an established, trusted name in the market,” said Brian Ballard, CEO and co-founder, Upskill. “By offering the Skylight platform on the Moverio BT-350 ANSI Edition smart glasses, we add increased choice for our customers looking to adopt high quality, industrial-grade AR devices to their operations to drive significant performance improvements across their workforce.”

We’re confident that addressing this workplace safety requirement and collaborating with Upskill, will enable enterprises to accelerate smart glasses adoption across the workforceDesigned to be worn in environments that require safety glasses, the new Moverio BT-350 ANSI model includes indoor and outdoor safety shields that meet ANSI Z87.1 safety certification requirements. Featuring a flexible and durable hinge-based headset, the Moverio BT-350 ANSI smart glasses can be worn comfortably on a wide range of head sizes.

Upskill has received numerous awards for Skylight, including recognition as a World Economic Forum Technology Pioneer, Gartner Cool Vendor, Hannover Messe Hermes Award Finalist, and most recently, Augmented World Expo’s “AR Best in Show,” to name a few. On average, customers using Skylight on smart glasses see a 32 per cent performance improvement in use cases that span manufacturing, logistics and field services. Skylight on the Moverio BT350 ANSI Edition creates a smart-safety glass solution for use anywhere eye protection is required for a safe working environment.

“Since Epson launched its first iteration of the Moverio smart glasses seven years ago, we have been diligently working to enhance the technology to meet the demands of end-users, including the need for an ANSI edition of the Moverio glasses,” said Michael Leyva, product manager, augmented reality solutions, Epson. “We’re confident that addressing this workplace safety requirement and collaborating with Upskill, will enable enterprises to accelerate smart glasses adoption across the workforce.”

Support and Availability The new Moverio BT-350 ANSI smart glasses will be available in July 2018 for $1,199 (USD) through authorized Epson resellers and Epson.com. For additional information on the Moverio BT-350 ANSI Glasses please visit fs-ne.ws/GNQh30l7Eh1

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With mobile computing and field service operations now becoming inextribably linked many field service organisations will benefit greatly from the full 4G coverage and in the not so distant future 5G could possibly make interactions between the field and the back office lightning fast and seamless. It will, therefore, be of interest to US field service organisations that Ericsson announced last week that the company has increased its U.S. footprint by expanding its 4G partnership with Verizon to include new markets.

This extended partnership includes Ericsson Radio System 4G LTE equipment which, in addition to enabling the latest advances in 4G LTE capabilities, will provide a 5G-ready platform that will allow Verizon to rapidly transition sites to 5G when they deploy the service in those markets.

The new markets will be deployed using Ericsson’s latest baseband and dual-band radios, an optimized solution for widescale high-capacity deployment. The solution will be software upgradeable to 5G and will deliver CAT-M and NB-IoT for Massive Internet of Things use cases, as well as industry-leading network capacity.

Verizon and Ericsson have partnered closely to drive the evolution of LTE by using LTE-Advanced features, enhancing capacity and speed on the Verizon 4G LTE network. In 2017, Verizon and Ericsson used these latest technologies to hit several industry milestones, including:

• Achieved 953 Mbps by combining licensed and unlicensed bands with four-carrier aggregation, 4x4 MIMO and 256 QAM in a real-world network environment in Florida
• Exceeded 1 Gbps speeds on the Verizon 4G LTE network using three-carrier aggregation

Verizon and Ericsson reached another milestone in 4G LTE-Advanced technologies that will serve as a stepping stone to 5G by completing their first deployment of FDD (Frequency Division Duplexing) Massive MIMO (Multiple Input – Multiple Output) on Verizon’s wireless network in Irvine, CA.

Ed Chan, Senior Vice President of Technology, Strategy, and Planning, Verizon, says: “We continue to be committed to bringing the best network to Verizon customers. Working with Ericsson allows us to deploy the latest technologies on our 4G LTE-Advanced network will be an important component of our rapid transition to 5G.”

This 4G LTE deployment will improve both spectral and energy efficiency, increasing network capacity for current devices in the market.Yossi Cohen, Head of Customer Unit Verizon, Ericsson North America, says: “We continue to work closely with Verizon to expand the strategic partnership between our companies, enabling Verizon to unleash the latest in 4G technology and simultaneously prepare to launch 5G in these new markets.”

This 4G LTE deployment will improve both spectral and energy efficiency, increasing network capacity for current devices in the market. Further enhancements are expected as the 5G ecosystem evolves. For customers, the result will be faster speeds for using apps and uploading and downloading files.

To prepare for 5G, Ericsson has released its first commercial 5G RAN software, allowing operators to turn on 5G in commercial networks when ready. In addition, the installed base of Ericsson Radio System radios from 2015 onwards can run 5G NR technology with a simple remote software installation.

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Service Fusion, a field service management software provider helping small and mid-sized field service companies streamline their businesses and increase customer satisfaction, has announced a $10M Series A investment from leading B2B software investor Five Elms Capital.

The financing will be used to fuel growth and accelerate the release of new functionality for its customer base of over 2,000 service contractors.

"We are thrilled to bring in a partner with so much experience in the B2B software space," said Max Paltsev, CEO of Service Fusion.

"Nearly 70% of service contractors don't use a specialized software to manage their business. This results in higher operating costs and missed opportunities to delight customers, and we are changing that with our software."

Nearly 70% of service contractors don't use a specialized software to manage their business. This results in higher operating costs and missed opportunities..."We are beyond excited to partner with Max and the team at Service Fusion," said Ryan Mandl, Partner at Five Elms Capital. "We believe the field service industry is in the early innings of a multi-decade shift to utilizing modern software solutions to more effectively manage operations and provide a better customer experience. Service Fusion has developed an industry-leading product and reputation for serving the needs of its customer base really well, both of which we plan to build on as we work together to fuel the company's next phase of growth."

Service Fusion's rapid growth will create a significant number of new jobs in the North Texas area as the company expands its engineering, customer support, and sales operations at its headquarters just outside of Dallas. "As one of the fastest growing technology companies in Texas, we are extremely excited to be able to create more career opportunities in this region," said Paltsev. "This investment will allow us to better serve our customers' needs by adding top-notch talent to every team at Service Fusion."

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A new report commissioned by Aberdeen Standard Investment’s AIPUT fund (Airport Industrial and Property Unit Trust) has highlighted the scale of progress and future potential for the adoption of automated transport and logistics technology at the UK’s airports, including London’s Heathrow, which recently received the formal support of Parliament for its third runway plans.

AIPUT currently holds 2 million sq ft of buildings at Heathrow, dedicated to supporting the airport’s freight and logistics service providers.

The report, produced jointly by specialist UK aviation real estate consultancy, ChappellKing and Dornier Consulting International GmbH, explores the potential efficiency gains from automation across a plethora of airport-related functions such as cargo-handling and logistics operations, as well as passenger transportation both to and within airports.

Commenting on the report, AIPUT Fund Manager, Nick Smith, said:  “Autonomous technology promises enormous benefits to airports and the service companies that support them, transforming the way airports work and improving efficiency and safety, both for passengers and other airport users. At Gatwick, for example, 90% of the airport’s airside vehicles are stationary at any one time, which is both hugely inefficient and demands a vast amount of space.

A much smaller pool of electric-powered autonomous vehicles would drastically cut costs, free up land, reduce emissions, and improve safety. In Düsseldorf, a newly-developed robotic car parking system has demonstrated a 60% reduction in required parking space compared to human drivers.”

“Airports and airport real estate providers need to be ready for the introduction of automated technology as soon as operational and safety regulations permit.  AIPUT intends to stay ahead of the curve by embracing automation, working with our tenants and partners to build autonomous technology into our site masterplans; which we believe will adapt and future-proof our UK estate assets, ensuring that our clients’ buildings and facilities will be able to accommodate and benefit fully from the rapid development of autonomous technology.”

This winter in Norway an autonomous snowplough was tested at Fagernes Airport, with a single machine able to clear an area of 68 acres in a single hour.Trials of a variety of autonomous technological applications have already taken place at a number of UK airports. The first trials of automated air-side vehicles have been completed at Heathrow in collaboration with IAG Cargo and Oxbotica.  Gatwick, meanwhile, recently became the first airport in the world to trial the use of autonomous vehicles to shuttle staff across the airfield, demonstrating that autonomous vehicles can operate safely in highly-complex airfield environments.

This winter in Norway an autonomous snowplough was tested at Fagernes Airport, with a single machine able to clear an area of 68 acres in a single hour. Autonomous technology increases the precision with which snowploughs operate, improving safety during the removal of snow and while driving information and low visibility.

The UK Government has signalled its support for the industry, with the announcement of £22.4 million of funding under the Industrial Strategy for off-road self-driving vehicles, which it believes will revolutionise productivity in a range of sectors, including mining, ports and airports.

As in many other fields of technological development, airports are providing the testbed for a plethora of different autonomous applications.  AIPUT will be ensuring that it is at the forefront of planning for and providing the cutting edge facilities that greater automation will require.

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