INTELLIGENT BRANDS // Mobile Technology
Three technologies boosting mobile field services
Augmented reality, predictive analytics, demand forecasting promise to improve key performance indicators for the mobile field workforce, explains Tom DeVroy at IFS.
The field service industry has always been one of the earliest adopters of new technologies, from the original personal digital assistants to IoT-enabled devices. Now, a new generation of technology is uniquely positioned to transform the field service industry, promising to reduce costs and improve the quality of service organisations can offer.
Effective field service is about proactively managing your workforce and inventory in order to meet the constantly sliding scale of customer expectations. As a result, field service organisations are constantly looking to improve on the key metrics to better serve customers including first-time fix rate, mean time to service, and mean time to repair.
Three new technology driven developments are establishing themselves in the market, with the potential to dramatically impact these field service metrics to benefit both the customer and service provider.
These can be listed as:
• Advanced mobility using augmented reality and messaging
• Predictive analytics enabling prescriptive maintenance
• Optimised scheduling and demand forecasting
Combining mobility and
1 augmented reality A mobile workforce needs a mobiledriven field service strategy. In a recent study on mobility, performance and engagement, 60 % of employees said mobile technology makes them more productive in the workplace. But field service organisations are now moving beyond simple mobility, looking for more intelligence and flexibility from their mobile computing platform in order to take full advantage of next generation devices.
Native applications are a key part of this, allowing engineers to receive instant updates, access repair information or collaborate with product experts without leaving the job site. Instant messaging platforms are allowing field service engineers to keep connected, with more information and
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