New service concepts for plant and machinery

The SPM (“service platform machine”) innovation network consists of a group of companies in the machine tools and plant engineering sector who are working together on future service concepts. They will start on the second phase of their research, focusing on support for sales teams and service technicians, at the end of October 2013.

The service activities of German plant and machinery manufacturers are going through a radical transformation. More and more service processes are now IT-based, and the rapid evolution of consumer technologies – for instance the increasingly widespread use of tablet PCs – is changing the way in which technical services are delivered. This trend is reinforced by the realization that companies will be able to earn more money from information and data generated, processed, and utilized in their service departments.

This situation led to the decision by a group of leading German engineering companies to continue their joint research on topics of importance to the future in the SPM innovation network, as of October 2013. One major aspect of this work is to enhance the performance of a configuration tool designed to support after-sales service teams. Fraunhofer IAO has entered into a development partnership with a leading systems provider for this purpose.

A second area of interest involves evaluating new technologies as to their suitability for use as support media for customer services and training media for service technicians. Emphasis will be given to high-performance consumer technologies that are already being used to an increasing extent in professional circles and will enable the creation of entirely new service concepts. After selecting the most promising technologies, the partners will develop appropriate concepts for their deployment, testing, and analysis.

The SPM innovation network still has room for other interested participants. For more information, please visit our website or contact us by phone.

Further information
At present, the SPM innovation network comprises service managers from the following companies: Balluff GmbH, Bosch Rexroth AG, Carl Zeiss IMT GmbH, DMG Vertriebs und Service GmbH, Engel Austria GmbH, Hirschmann Automation and Control GmbH, Innosoft GmbH, manroland web systems GmbH, profi TS, Schaeffler AG, Symmedia GmbH, Trumpf Werkzeugmaschinen GmbH & Co. KG.

www.service-plattform-maschine.de

Contact:
Bernd Bienzeisler
Service Work Innovation
Fraunhofer IAO
Nobelstraße 12
70569 Stuttgart, Germany
Phone +49 711 970-2088
Email: bernd.bienzeisler@iao.fraunhofer.de