By: Michael Broberg, Associate Vice President- SAP Practice

Many industries have increasingly adopted business models bundling products and services over the last couple of decades. There are two main reasons for this:

A ) It creates switching costs for customers, enabling companies to create customer-centric business models

B) It generates a new and stable revenue stream, effectively creating an annuity, whereas product sales fluctuate.

The aftermarket services and solutions model has grown in several industries, including but not limited to:

• Automation and Control Solutions
• Energy and Power Equipment
• Industrial and Commercial Machinery/Equipment
• Heavy Equipment and Material Handling
• Transportation Equipment

LTIMindtree has set its sights on providing top-notch aftermarket services and solutions to companies in any industry that produces physical goods, typically machinery and equipment – otherwise known as capital goods. We are dedicated to offering ongoing preventive maintenance and repair services to help companies maintain the efficiency and longevity of their equipment.

As part of our mission, we help companies bundle their physical products and services into an integrated offering that can be priced on a per-usage basis, part of an integrated service contract, or even as separate products or offerings. We aim to make it easier for companies to offer a comprehensive and hassle-free service to their customers, ensuring they stay competitive in today’s ever-changing market.

The aftermarket services industry typically has field service engineers and/or in-house engineers for repairs and preventive maintenance.

Strategic priorities

Their priorities typically include:

Customer challenges demystified

To realize these strategic priorities, an underlying application architecture of tightly integrated systems in real-time with maximum automation is needed. This would replace a frequently fragmented architecture consisting of broken processes and manual steps. Challenges include:

• Multiple trips needed to solve customer issues
• Managing complex pricing and products
• Selling Both products and services solutions
• Low productivity of field technicians
• High customer churn due to poor customer experience
• Lack of omnichannel capabilities

LTIMindtree’s out of the box solution

To address the challenges, LTIMindtree has created an architecture based on SAP products and added templated processes and implementation accelerators.

In addition, we have added accelerators:

Benefits

Our aftermarket services and solutions delivers clear, documented benefits:

• Revenue growth: Empowers Original Equipment Manufacturers (OEMs), through their field service engineers, to identify new opportunities that would have otherwise been overlooked. Other benefits include maintenance contracts with customers and scheduled maintenance plans based on equipment information.
• Inventory optimization: A real-time link between the front and back office creates an integrated supply chain that enables OEMs to increase the order fill rate and reduce the inventory it holds.
• Enhanced products and services: Instant feedback mechanisms enable OEMs to improve their offerings constantly. This is supplemented by IoT applications that track temperatures and usage, resulting in increased product uptime for OEM customers (an indirect benefit). Additionally, it provides opportunities for sophisticated pricing.
• Reduction in customer churn: providing products and services as a bundle creates stickiness and barriers to entry for any newcomer.
• Decreased cost of service: enhanced service technician productivity through improved integration with the back office regarding quotes, product information, and spare part availability.

Final remarks

The aftermarket services industry is still rapidly developing its business models, and LTIMindtree’s industry-specific consultants and solutions are well-equipped to help them accelerate the journey.