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As the last remaining vestiges of tinsel are tidied away from the corners here at Field Service News Towers, our Editor-in- Chief Kris Oldland dusts off his crystal ball and begins a new series looking at what is going to be the key trends for field service companies this coming year...

As the Editor of a trade magazine, you know you're always going to be asked to put some kind of list together come the start of the year predicting the big trends in the market, and you know invariably some of them you’ll get right and some of them you’ll get wrong.

Last year was no exception, I suggested that the Internet of Things would start to become an integral part of field service operations, which in some ways it did (there are certainly more case studies of field service IoT implementations now than there were a year ago), the Cloud would finally come of age as a platform for field service management systems (which our own research showed to be partially true, there is a growing move to the Cloud but it remains a gradual shift) and that 2015 would be the year that 3D printing would make a true breakthrough (woefully optimistic as despite huge potential I’ve yet to see a genuine application for 3D printing in a field service environment.)

Yet as I look through this year’s list I find that the trends I’ve highlighted are, in the main not so much about brand new emerging technologies or concepts, but more their evolution from fledgling ideas to real-life applications now soaring in full flight.

 

Therefore for once I’m feeling more confident that most of this list will come good by the end of the year.

Indeed, I would go as far as to say that if the last few years have been all about exciting innovation, as twenty first century technologies drive us into a Gene Roddenbury inspired brave new world, then 2016 may well be the start of a period of maturation, and fulfilment.

Is 2016 the year we finally stop talking about how things are going to be in the not so distant future and start realising that this is how we are going to be doing things in the here and now?

Only time will tell, but for what it’s worth, here’s how I see the year panning out...

Servitization will become a common way of doing business

On the outset a radical shift in business thinking, driven largely from the UK with an American English spelling, servitization has a number of different monikers including ‘outcome based solutions’, ‘through life-cycle services’ and ‘advanced services’.

The concept itself, which in reality can be dated back easily to the 1960’s and less tangibly so even earlier, involves the shift in thinking away from the traditional transactional nature of manufacturing a product to sell, and then providing services to ensure the upkeep of that product, towards an approach whereby a product is manufactured with the view of delivering a long-term service.

The (perhaps overly used and certainly overly simplistic) often cited example is ‘Don’t sell drills, sell holes’ something that many switched on sales people will be fully aware of as solutions based selling has been a staple of the consultative sell in the twilight of the last century and the early dawn of this one.

 

And at it’s heart that’s what Servitization is really all about.

However, it is doing so on a company wide scale, taking a neat, piffy one liner and reinventing the whole company structure around the premise.

The all time most cited example of servitization has to be Rolls Royce who in the sixties working with American Airlines adopted a servitized approach, coining it ‘power-by-the-hour’ and in doing so re-wrote the rules for the aviation industry.

Other big name examples of servitization also come from companies as diverse as Pearson, Caterpillar and MAN Trucks (UK) but for some time the examples of truly servitized businesses beyond these headline hogging few were in short supply.

However, in part due to the ongoing work from academia by the likes of Tim Baines (Aston), Andy Neely (Cambridge) and Howard Lightfoot (Cranfield) but also driven heavily by the emergence of the Internet of Things, Enterprise Mobility and Machine to Machine communications, we are finallystarting to see servitization beginning to really come to the fore.

At last year’s Spring Servitization Conference hosted by Baines and his colleagues at Aston University we saw academia and industry on the same page and companies ranging from global PLCs such as Air France KLM and recycling and mining giant Metso through to family owned transit packaging firm Nicklin all taking the steps towards building a servitized business operation.

 

With servitization bringing the promise of both greater long term profits as well as a better service for the clients (leading to longer-term contracts – which of course provides stability for a business,) it is little wonder that companies such as Sony are beginning to adopt the model and there is a definite feel that the concept is now gaining momentum.

For us in field service this is perhaps a double edged sword.

On the one hand it means that service now sits proudly at the top table as an absolutely critical part of a business strategy.

On the other however, it means that we need to be 100% on top of our game, as a fundamental factor in a servitized business model is that unless the client has uptime, the service provider isn’t getting paid.

However, the simple fact is that servitization is coming to an industry near you and it will perhaps be those companies that neglect to pay attention to the phenomenon that may come under threat.

 

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Look out for the second part of this feature where we look at the impact the Internet of Things and Augmented Reality may have on field service in 2016

 

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The world of manufacturing is going through a seismic change with parallels being drawn to the industrial revolution. And as the trend of servitization takes seed the role of the field service engineer takes centre stage and is more important than ever before. Nick Frank, Principal Consultant of Frank Partners explains...

‘I am still making order out of the chaos of reinvention’ said novelist John Le Carre as he penned another cold war spy thriller.

Many would say the same is true of manufacturing today. Gone are the days when a manufacturer simply made the product, delivered it to the customer, sometimes supplied some parts & services, and then moved onto the next sale. In today’s unpredictable world, this model is fast becoming unsustainable.

Accelerated by the chaos of the financial crisis and propelled by the industrial internet, many businesses are moving beyond this traditional notion of manufacturing. No longer do they just ‘make stuff’, they provide services such as financing, maintenance programmes, lifecycle consulting or even outcome orientated service contracts. Complex equipment manufacturers are leading the way in evolving ever more strategic relationships with their clients, as they deliver their technology as a service outcome rather than stand-alone product.

 

Why is this important? It’s not just that product transaction orientated business models are being replaced by those centered on relationships, outcomes and service. But that to achieve this re-invention, manufacturing must overcome a severe skills shortage! Without people and skills, all the advances in technology and thinking will stagnate. Companies need to attract a completely new talent pool into their industry. One that is technically and socially more diverse and which has many of the marketing, customer experience and media skills found in the FMCG and financial sectors.

If manufacturing is re-inventing itself, so must the services back-office. Much has been written around how IoT and analytics will change the nature of field service in terms of efficiency, transparency and customer relationship management. All this is true, but more profoundly as the product/service boundary blurs towards solutions, so the idea of field service as an entity must fundamentally change. Rather than being perceived as a ‘bolt on’ entity fixing customer problems, field service must be integrated into the business. As this happens it too must broaden its skills set, outlook and relationships, especially in the areas engineering, sales and other service back-office operations.

As connectivity and data become more available in real time, so increasingly problems can be solved centrally. As service thinking becomes more embedded in manufacturing businesses, so even self-healing technologies may be introduced into product design. One can see that this will require a completely different approach as to how service organisations are perceived and managed. It is logical that in order to provide seamless outcomes and experiences to the customer, organisations will become much more integrated, between, centralised technical support, the machine itself, local support, 3^rd parties and parts and sales/relationship management. Exactly how this happens will depend on the business models being supported.

For example in the Asia-Pacific market a leading supplier of industrial robots see their mix of Field /Central services swinging from 60/40% to 40/60% as they increasingly integrate remote services into their solutions. There are companies in the defence industry who have their service team located in situ on warships where they are contracted to provide availability. These are perhaps the more extreme examples of the moment, but one can clearly see that there is a link between the technologies, the contractual relationship with the customer, and the organisation of the service organisation.

 

We we will also see field service and centralised support organisation being closer to the sales teams. Just look at the emphasis we have seen in recent years on the Trusted Advisor roles and the discussions of how field service as one of the major customer touch-points, has a significant impact on customer experience. Trying to balance relationship skills with technical problem solving is a real challenge for the industry.

The bottom line is that as manufacturing re-invents itself, so field service as an integral part of most service offerings will become a significant part of the companies growth strategy. How this will happen is difficult to tell, because we are still in the early stages of a manufacturing revolution. However, this re-invention of manufacturing is exciting from two perspectives. It means that a more diverse and broader skills set must be attracted into industry. And secondly that field service itself will need to adapt to evolving product technologies and business models bringing new challenges and opportunities for its people.

To be part of this re-invention process, Service Leaders can follow a simple 3 point plan:

1. Undertake a strategic re-evaluation of the customer /industry supply chain to identify how services can contribute to sustainable business growth.
2. Experiment with and adopt connectivity technologies to discover the cost and business model benefits
3. Constantly look at how other businesses are adapting. This Outside-In perspective will speed up your adoption of innovation and can be gained in many ways. You can achieve this through not only reading publications such as Field Service News, but by joining networks such as that offered by ‘The Manufacturer’ to explore the role of Manufacturing Services in industry (MSTLN.com), the Service Community (www.service-community.uk) or the servitization courses for industry by the Aston Business School, UK.

 

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September is a busy time for conferences, and if you are in the UK there's an opportunity to attend two very down to earth events.  Here’s a preview by Nick Frank,  who also reports on the latest developments in a campaign to re-invent manufacturing and service in the UK.

30th September: The Service Community

Hosted by the Aston University in Birmingham. A very different event for service industry professionals. We are expecting over 40 participants to discuss and debate how Big Data is being used to affect customer outcomes. Practitioners from Rolls Royce, Pitney Bowes and Inca will be discussing their personal experiences.  In addition we will have a view of the future from Andreas Schroeder of the Aston Business School. This event is unique: there are no sponsors, no hidden agendas, just professionals talking to professionals…a true community. To sign up see the Service Community website

6th October: Creating Value through Service.

A one-day conference hosed by the Cambridge Service Alliance . Although a paid conference, I always find the CSA events well worth going to as they present ideas that are on the leading edge of services development in industry.

Something up in UK manufacturing

There is something up in the UK which will have tremendous implication on field service in the future. I was at the House Commons with Professor Raj Roy and his team from Cranfield as well as senior leaders from some of the UK’s leading manufacturing and engineering companies when they presented a case for a National Policy for Through Life Engineering Services to MPs.

Through Life Engineering Services can be described as ‘Engineering for Life’ – making things work better for longer; delivering lifetime value from products, assets and infrastructure

Cranfield’s EPSRC Centre for Innovative Manufacturing has been working on the engineering expertise that underpins the ability for companies to provide their customers with AVAILABILITY and/or OUTCOME based contracts. These contracts reflect a world where customers no longer want to purchase the asset, but are redefining their needs in terms of outcomes - Rolls Royce’s Power by the Hour is one of the best known examples.

Research has shown that the TES market in the UK generated £23bn revenues for the UK. The exciting thing for the UK is that politicians, technology and industry are starting to realise that manufacturing must re-invent itself, if it is to be sustainable and competitive. They see that manufacturing is no longer just about the product. With the IoT, data and analytics it has become much much more fuzzy. This has tremendous implications for field service. A National Policy will speed up this change and hence the new skills sets required to effectively operate in these re-defined business environment. We will return to this subject at a later date.

Welcome back from summer!!

 

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Faced with high fuel costs, congestion, driver shortages and changing delivery patterns, the UK road transport industry has to change radically to improve profit margins and survive. Servitization is the solution, recommends this report by Eleanor Musson and Dr Ali Bigdeli  of the Aston Centre for Servitization Research and Practice

The road transport industry is crucial to the UK economy; 68% of freight goods are moved by road according the UK's Department for Transport Transport Statistics 2014. But the industry faces the challenges of fuel costs, driver shortages, congestion and regulation. Moreover changing consumer behaviour in the UK is turning the industry on its head; 74% of adults bought goods or services online in 2014, compared with 53% in 2008, according to the Office for National Statistics, Internet Access in Households 2014, and the demand for flexible, fast delivery is growing rapidly according to the Guardian newspaper.  These are just some of the factors behind the low profit margins in the industry: 3% for operators , reports the  Freight Transport Association in its 2014 Logistics Report,  and 6% for manufacturers.

This industry has to change radically. There is little to be gained from piecemeal changes to products or pricing; the customer’s priorities and requirements must be placed at the heart of operational strategies. This is achieved through what we call advanced services, which are implemented in an organisation through servitization. Advanced Services are provided by manufacturers and technology innovators with an intimate understanding of the customer’s business priorities, and their difficulties in achieving these. They are a package of a product, and the services that go around the use of the product, consumed as a single offering, which help the customer achieve its requirements.

In order to understand how advanced services and servitization are being adopted in the road transport industry, we interviewed a panel of senior executives from within vehicle manufacturers, component manufacturers, operators, fleet management companies and technology providers, and we outline some of our findings here.

There are three categories of advanced service currently been offered in this industry: [ordered_list style="decimal"]

1. The first is vehicle condition and safety related services. Real-time reporting about the condition and performance of the vehicle helps the service provider (e.g. manufacturer, fleet management company) to see how the vehicle is being used by the customer, which mitigates the contractual risk and gives opportunities for service and product improvement. Data are used to help fleet managers monitor costs and identify problem vehicles, either by sharing the information with the customer, or by the manufacturer providing this function as a service. For fuel efficiency and safety, manufacturers test tyre pressure and tread depth, with real-time reporting to alert drivers to problems, and service operatives on hand to make repairs or replacements.
2. The second type of services is driver-related services. Through the use of telematics, the manufacturers and operators are able to assess how the truck is being driven, to examine any incidents such as harsh breaking, speeding and idling, and to inspect driving and rest periods. This data is analysed to identify training requirements and in some cases pay performance bonuses.
3.   The third type is route planning and delivery services. Real-time reporting allows operators to manage routes, taking into account live road conditions. Data on deliveries made compared to schedule and route information enable managers to identify opportunities for improvement.

Advanced services have a three-fold impact in the industry:[ordered_list style="decimal"]

1. Efficiency
   The greatest efficiencies are achieved by maximising the uptime of vehicles, planning routes efficiently, and processing orders. To illustrate:
   • The use of technologies and data by skilled route planning staff reduces mileage driven by up to 10%
   • Uptime is maximised by reducing roadside failures thanks to greater visibility of the vehicle, its condition and how it’s being used
   • Operators can expect at least a 5-15% reduction in vehicle maintenance and service costs as a result of condition monitoring according to telematics specialist Microlise
2. Safety and better image
   Driver-related services have had a significant impact on driving standards, and in turn the image of operators and the industry. In this regard:
   • Microlise reports customers see annual reductions in speeding incidents of up to 90%, and a reduction of up to 60% in the number of accidents.
   • The same report states operators are seeing a 5-15% reduction in carbon emissions as a result of optimised routes and better driving.
3. Cost Savings By enabling improvements in driving performance and better, more informed route planning, technology is helping to deliver cost savings in terms of fuel usage. According to the Freight Transport Association's Manager's Guide to Distribution Costs, fuel represents on average of 30% of the cost of a vehicle . The average unit costs £49,000 per year in fuel. Microlise reports an average 10% (£4-5000) saving on each unit’s fuel consumption being achieved by customers using driver management and training tools.

Recommendations

While the leading organisations demonstrate what can be achieved, our research demonstrated that advanced services are not being adopted universally or uniformly in this industry. In order to accelerate this, we recommend that manufacturers ensure advanced services are properly led and embedded. Servitization is a wide ranging, complex process that requires transformation and coordination of an entire organisation. In most companies, it doesn’t fit neatly within the realm of one department. Just like any other organisational change, servitization needs a champion to lead it and generate buy-in across departments.

Servitization provides an opportunity to ‘be closer to the customer’ which can also be facilitated by innovative pricing models which assure the prospective service user of the level of commitment, and create alignment of objectives between service provider and user. Selling and supporting services is a very different proposition to selling products, requiring different skills and reward structures. Manufacturers will need to invest in training their staff, and consider the incentive and reward structures that will generate the desired outcomes.

The full whitepaper report Delivering Growth can be downloaded here:

 

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“I think a lot of the fundamentals are the same in terms of business logic” Kowalkowski explained “but the problem with some of the business model concepts in general is that two key components are missing. One is culture and how to foster a service culture; that’s often much harder than just acquiring the necessary resources.”

“The other one would be leadership and how to really drive this because it is a change management process. How to motivate the employees at all levels within the organisation to form a strong coalition and to be able to show short term gain on this journey – because it’s a long journey” he added.

One of the interesting concepts Kowalkowski raised in his own presentation was that of ‘reverse servitization’ where some companies are offering advanced services and complex solutions, which they have been offering for many years, or even in some cases decades.

For these companies Kowalkowski asserts, the main challenge is not to come up with new complex solutions but rather to scale down those service initiatives, unbundling them and recombining service elements and providing  them in a more efficient and standardised manner.

 

Indeed Kowalkowski believes there are many companies that are operating on a business model very close to that of servitization without necessarily having ever planned to do so, who arrived there simply through adopting a highly customer centric business outlook.

Air France KLM

Indeed,  one very high profile company in attendance at the conference had done just that: Air France KLM are the oldest and second largest airline in the world.  Harman Lanser who heads up the product development and logistics division within the airline's maintenance and engineering division was another of the keynote speakers at the event.  During his presentation he outlined how he realised that the organisation was actually operating on a very similar system to servitization.

“Last year I was at a presentation where Tim Baines showed me the concept of servitization and I realised we were doing something similar to that, not knowing how close it was.  I have been going through the process of moving from component availability to total aircraft care to an integrated service support for the airline KLM.  Now I am exploring if this is something we can offer to customers”

“Doing it for the airline you work for is one thing doing it for an airline where you only do the service for, where your not responsible for the end product of the airline is different. What does it take to be able to give a completely integrated services product to a third party customer?"he asked.  “The trust you need, the reliability you need and the dependency you create between the companies.”

And herein lies perhaps one of the biggest keys to unlocking a successful servitization model. It is fundamental that there is trust built up over many years of good relationships with customers to get their understanding and buy-in of how and why you are proposing to move to an outcome-based business model.

“For these kind of services, you need at least ten years of working together, I would say,” confirmed Lanser “

 

Technology is an enabler

In addition to strong customer relationships, and the culture and leadership that Kowalkowski referred to, the other key enabler discussed at length during the conference was the technology.

Indeed, Kowalkowski believes that technology is the final key enabler that is allowing such companies to now make the final transition into being a fully servitized businesses.  “You can find academic papers that go back 90 years that talk about selling transportation instead of cars, selling mileage instead of tyres but back then you didn’t have the technology,” he explained. “Today with all the digitalisation you can do so many new things. Technology really is the key enabler”

With so many layers to discuss and in depth explorations of what is a truly exciting area, one that will of course have huge implications for the delivery of field service the more the movement gains pace, the Aston Spring Servitzation Conference proved to be an engaging two days for this vibrant global community.

"One of the things we’ve tried to do and have managed to do successfully is to try and keep the whole community together as we go through some forty presentations and to do that in one room over two days has been a very demanding thing to do but it’s been the right thing to do because we, as a community, debated these concepts”

“I’m delighted that we’ve demonstrated that we are moving forward in this space so overall it’s been a great two days, it’s been an exhausting two days but it’s been really worthwhile and next year…. we’re going to do it all again.”

 

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The shift from traditional manufacturer to fully fledged servitized business was a bold and revolutionary move when MAN Trucks UK made the transition but it ultimately led them to a huge growth spree when the rest of the market was in decline.

The man driving that change was Des Evans, former Managing Director of MAN UK and now an Honarary Professor at Aston Business School.

Evans was also one of the guest speakers at a recent Service Community event and Field Service News Editor, Kris Oldland caught up with him there to find out more about why and how MAN UK made the shift to becoming one of the great examples of servitization.

 

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The next Service Community event is being held on the 30th September and attendance is free for Field Service News subscribers. To register your place please send your contact details to TheServiceCommunity@gmail.com

 

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The world of academia and industry came together at the end of May to discuss the latest theories and trends in servitization at the Aston University Spring Servitization Conference. Held in the purpose-built Aston conference centre in the heart of the University and hosted by the Aston Centre for Servitization Research and Practice, the conference holds a unique position within the servitization community in bringing together representatives of both academia and industry. Kris Oldland was there.

Aston's own Professor Tim Baines is widely considered by many to be one of a handful of people at the very top of this field and he was joined by academics from across the globe from Helsinki, to Tokyo, from Hangzou to Glasgow. Industry was also well represented with companies of all sizes in attendance ranging from third generation family-run Nicklin Transit Packaging through to blue chip companies such as Air France and Goodyear.

“The purpose of the conference is best expressed as three objectives,” explained Baines. “Firstly, to bring the researchers in the field together to really consolidate the knowledge base around servitization, so where are we today with servitization.”

“Secondly it’s to bridge theory and practice, to bring practitioners into the mix, talk about their experiences and let the academics learn from that and vice versa.”

“And the third thing is possibly the most important of the three: it’s all about community building. All too often that the community of servitization is disparate and fragmented, this conference is about bringing the international community together to share their experiences on servitization, their research on servitization.”

 

There certainly was a genuine buzz of community throughout the two days, which was greatly enhanced by the format itself. With no less than forty presentations being presented across two days the danger of death by PowerPoint ran higher here than at most conferences. However, the ten minute rule – strictly enforced by Baines and his colleagues - kept everyone on their toes and the sessions were well supported by a slick app which allowed for feedback and questions for each presentation. This added a good interactive element which kept the audience involved throughout.

The advantage of so many presentations, of course, is that there were a phenomenal number of talking points being generated from each session, so as we made our way to the networking coffee breaks each time the courtyard area was full of debate and discussion.

Whilst servitization is indeed gaining a lot of traction at the moment, it remains an unknown area for many or at best an area of confusion for others. In it’s simplest sense servitization is the shift from a traditional transactional manufacturing approach (whereby we build a build a product, sell it and then offer some form of aftermarket service to help maintain that product for a specific period of time) to a model where we build a product in order to sell the service itself.

Sony and Telemadrid

A great example of this approach is  the brand new state-of-the-art system Sony Professional Systems Europe have just installed for Spanish news company Telemadrid, replacing an existing suite. However, instead of Telemadrid having to pay a big lump sum they are paying Sony on a pay-per-usage basis.

The benefits for Sony are that over the longer term they can generate greater profits for longer periods plus embed themselves within their customers’ workflow making customer retention far higher.

 

The benefits for Telemadrid are that they have a far more manageable cost line on their proft and loss sheets, they have access to the very latest technology and  they need no internal technicians to service that technology. Most  importantly, it is in Sony’s best interests to ensure that Telemadrid receive 100% uptime otherwise they will face severe financial penalties. Result: Telemadrid knows the service they receive will be reliable.

(For the full story on how Sony is transforming its service business  in Europe read our in-depth two-part interview with John Cooper, Head of IT and workflow Management, Europe here)

This trend will continue as more and more  companies are pulled into a servitization model by their customers. Rolls Royce’s power-by-the-hour is one of the best-known examples of the servitization model and was the direct result of American Airlines demanding such a service from the jet engine manufacturer some thirty years ago). Other companies are seeking to adopt a servitization model for reasons such as improving profits or differentiating themselves from their competition.

METSO

One company that has just made the transition to servitization is mining, utilities and recycling organisation Metso. John Cullen, Vice President of Marketing and Brand, was one of the keynote speakers at the conference and outlined how and why Metso had made the shift.

“At the moment I would say we are at the beginning of the process,” Cullen began.  “We’ve actually been going through a process of servitization within our company but it’s a journey that started some three years ago when our services unit was put into a separate division having previously been attached to the different product businesses.”

But why have they made this move? In fact there were a number of different reasons that led Metso went this path. “There were a number of different drivers for us,” Cullen stated. From a customer perspective we weren’t delivering to our customers everything that they wanted. They were looking for us to take a more active role in their business processes and support them, where we tended to be very much more reactive.”

“Secondly we already had a lot of great service products within the company but they weren’t recognised because we weren’t selling them as a servitized products. We were just coming to our customers and saying what problems do you have, we can fix it."

 

“So we really needed to change the way we were doing things from being reactive to proactive. For us, it helps our business develop new revenue streams, but it also means we deliver a better service to our customers.”

The cultural challenge

Of course such a radical shift in business strategy needs not only the buy-in from the executive level but also from all members within the organisation. Something which can prove to be a significant hurdle for companies to overcome when moving to a servitized business model.

“When we presented these concepts they’ve actually been embraced by our people but one of the challenges is that we are changing the way people do their job in everything. So what we are asking people to do is throw away maybe twenty years of doing things and look at things in a completely different way and that’s hard for anybody to do,” explained Cullen.

“It’s about a cultural shift. The positives being that people are interested, they’re eager and they do see the benefits but actually doing it but, still, changing the way you’ve been doing things is a difficult thing to do.”

 

It is, of course, a cultural shift for Metso’s clients too. It’s a big point of discussion: should companies try to roll out such an approach to all of their customers in one go or is it better to perhaps apply the Pareto principle and roll the changes out to those customers your closer to first?

For Metso the intention is to take the first approach although the reality of doing so isn’t particularly straightforward. “It’s an approach that we are trying to put out to every company but the practicalities are that we have to start with a few customers within various territories and then actually develop competence within the organisation to deliver,” Cullen explained.

“But it’s not something we want to limit,” he added, “It’s a culture and we want to change the culture everywhere.”

 

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Look out for Part 2 of this report from the Servitization conference  where we'll hear from Christian Kowalkowski of the Hanken School of Economics on how servitization has evolved over the past decade.

 

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Field Service News Editor-in-Chief, Kris Oldland reflects on a busy summer in the European field service industry in his leader for issue seven of Field Service News...

Click here and complete the brief form to download a digital copy of Field Service News issue seven now

I’ll be honest, when the doors closed on the third day of this year’s Service Management Expo I gave an almighty sigh of relief...

Not only was it the end of a very busy three days but it also marked the end of what was an incredibly busy conference season in the European field service industry and to be quite frank I think everyone needed to take five just to catch their breath.

Since we published the last edition of Field Service News we’ve attended the Aston Spring Servitization Conference, The Field Service Forum, The TomTom Telematics Developers Conference and of course the Service Management Expo and each of these events brought into focus some of the key conversations that are happing in our industry today.

There has been an abundance of excellent content produced by some of the leading figures in Telematics, Servitization, IoT, Artificial Intelligence and much more with each outlining how these varying tools and technologies will impact on field service.

And whilst long may it continue, it is also good to have a little bit of time in these long, hot summer months to let all these ideas, concepts and strategies tumble around in our heads for a while. Then, as we move into the final quarter of the year, our thoughts and plans around how we can harness some of these concepts, can solidify and evolve into strategies with substance.

And as I start to bring some of my own thoughts into focus my first initial observation is that so many of these new trends are interconnected.

In the past I’ve explained my belief in this column that we are entering a golden age of service, driven by a perfect storm of technologies emerging together and if anything the last few months have reaffirmed that belief.

Service is no longer an after thought but a primary business driver and if there was ever any doubt about this it was completely eradicated at the Aston Servitization Conference.

It was fantastic to see academics and industry leaders coming together to learn from each other and at the end of an intensive two days there was no doubt in my mind that this growing trend of Servitization was moving very quickly from academic theory with a handful of industry examples (albeit high profile ones) to a considerable shift in business thinking which is continuing to gather momentum.

Indeed the topic of servitization raised it’s head again when I interviewed Sony’s John Cooper with Cooper providing a perfect example of Servitization in a new contract with Spanish media outlet Telemadrid. As Cooper himself explains “when it’s pay-per-usage - it becomes all about the service.”

Which of course brings us back to the technology, for working in the parameters of an outcome based solutions contract means that your field service operations have to be highly efficient to ensure you are delivering the uptime levels such contracts are built upon.

IoT is of course one such technology that is truly driving these changes in business thinking and culture. Sony for example employ a number of remote monitoring and diagnostics tools across their B2B technology range, and such connected devices are huge enablers for companies moving from a traditional reactive type of service operation, to a more proactive type of operation that an advanced services approach requires.

 

And it is not just the devices our engineers are repairing and maintaining that are becoming connected, it is their tools and even their vehicles themselves that are becoming connected also.

It is of course no surprise that the connected vehicle dominated conversation at the TomTom Developers Conference, but in fact it wasn’t the only game changer for fleet management discussed that day in Amsterdam.

We also saw TomTom Telematics redefine themselves as a Platform as a Service for the telematics industry with the launch of their Apps Store, and this new model for telematics, built on open integration, is something of a game changer.

It is a smart move by the Dutch Telematics giant and one which couldn’t have been better timed as another major player in the Telematics space, Microlise who have a phenomenal reputation within the haulage sector, have also turned their attention to field service with the launch of a very slick new solution Clear. 

And then of course there are the two technologies that are underpinning most change in field service, Mobile and the Cloud. 18 months ago we researched the Cloud and I made some bold predictions around it’s adoption in field service. In our latest research project we revisit some of those claims and see if, how and why the adoption of Cloud based solutions in our industry has moved on at all within the last 18 months.

Time to let those little grey cells get to work...

The growing industrial trend of servitization amongst manufacturers is gaining traction and as it does so ever more importance is placed upon delivering efficient and effective field service.

The Aston Spring Servitization Conference brought together industry and academia to discuss the latest developments within the field and Field Service News was there to find out more...

 

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