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The future of Professional Digital Services
There’s a paradigm shift underway in how professional services provide value to process-intensive industries. In response to the dramatic rise in connected digital technologies and IoT-based applications, the time-honored standard of reactive, onsite maintenance and repair services for industrial enterprises is pivoting toward a more people-focused model. Customers join with professional service teams and achieve winning business outcomes using smart digital technology, applied in consultation with those trusted experts. As manufacturers undertake modernization initiatives to bring their operations up to Industry 4.0 levels, many have discovered that embracing long-term digital service partnerships that deliver data-generated business intelligence is key to helping them enhance operational and financial performance, while boosting their competitive edge.
Considering the recent technological and market disruptions, there’s never been a better time for manufacturers to reassess their digital initiatives. And just as agile ways of working have become the norm, industry leaders may be surprised by how digital services for industrial automation have adapted to become fast, efficient, flexible, scalable, and individualized.
Why now? The benefits of accessing collective wisdom
While every manufacturer’s business is unique, they all face a singular challenge — how to leverage digital technology and enhanced connectivity to access real-time insights across processes, merchandise, people, and partners. Inaction is not an option, as, in today’s commoditized competitive environment, access to richer and timelier analytics is often the linchpin behind any strategy to boost the productivity of legacy industrial operations. However, a recent global survey by Deloitte indicates that even though 94% of executives in industrial companies appreciate the urgency of such a digital transformation, only 14% are highly confident in their organization’s ability to implement it fully.
The good news is that collaborative business ecosystems are already forming to meet the challenges of increasing digitalization. Industrial enterprises worldwide have achieved meaningful benefits by partnering with OEM services experts who are skilled in integrating complex digital technologies into fully integrated solution platforms. The right digital services partnership should offer manufacturers wide-ranging benefits that include:
- Lower costs, higher profits, and enhanced growth – Digital tools help to virtualize processes and infrastructure while giving organizations access to the real-time data and insights they need to boost efficiency and profitability across their operations.
- Empowering workers with smarter, more collaborative decision making – Employees gain the visibility and insight needed to reduce risk, improve operational and business decisions, and perform their daily tasks more effectively. These benefits come from merging predictive analytics with real-time control and safety system data, then sharing information across departments.
- Better agility and resilience – Optimizing manufacturing operations is key to ensuring enterprises have the flexibility to adapt to changing markets, supply chain fluctuations, and competitive disruption.
- Proactive issue identification – Asset-intensive industries, including those with distributed systems or remote assets, can attain major capital and operating costs reductions by implementing a remote monitoring program with advanced predictive maintenance capabilities.
Novel technology enables custom-made experiences
In the new digital services landscape, cutting-edge providers can tailor and present individualized offerings that combine the exact services that suit the needs of their business and complement the skill sets of their staff. In the case of Schneider Electric’s Customer FIRST Flex program, the objective is to provide support service solutions that are:
- Scalable – whether it’s on-site or remote services, preventative and corrective maintenance, or spare parts delivery, choose the services that meet current needs, with the option to change as business requirements evolve.
- Cost-efficient – services optimized to deliver on performance requirements, while meeting budget constraints.
- Digital – tools and consulting services to help accelerate digital transformation, whether your journey is just beginning, or well underway.
- Sustainable – with better control system visibility, energy conservation, and cost reduction initiatives can deliver improved results.
- Cyber secure – stringent cybersecurity best practices in line with global standards keep information safe and secure.
Make decisions informed by data and expertise
Extracting value and insight from ever-increasing quantities of data is fundamental to ensuring Connected Services deliver on the promise of increased efficiency and profitability. Schneider Electric has specifically designed its digital service offerings to help customers extract the most value from their connected assets. Expert engineers combine their proficiencies with cutting-edge technology to analyze data and proactively identify the intervention areas that can bring the most value to customers. It is by empowering people to understand the profitability potential of their production assets that data can best be converted into business intelligence.
