MachineMetrics Launches industry's first AI-driven remote machine monitoring solution for OEM’s and Equipment Providers at IMTS 2018

What if you could stop a machine before a catastrophic failure? What if you could predict problems—before they cause downtime? What if you could diagnose and resolve problems for your customers without ever leaving your office?

MachineMetrics is answering these questions with the release of their latest application: MachineMetrics Service. MachineMetrics Service is the industry's first AI-driven remote machine monitoring solution designed for OEM’s and Equipment providers; a predictive analytics application on the MachineMetrics Industrial IoT platform that allows service teams to remotely monitor and manage machine assets in the field and at customer sites in real-time. Using MachineMetrics Service, equipment manufacturers can transform their approach to service with the ability to see, understand and take action on their customer’s real-time machine data from anywhere at any time.

“For years now we have been working directly with manufacturers to improve manufacturing equipment uptime, OEE, and productivity with real-time machine monitoring and analytics,” said Bill Bither, CEO of MachineMetrics, “By allowing machines to be monitored remotely and in real-time, we are enabling OEM’s to extend these benefits to their customer base while providing them with faster, better service. Our data science team is working closely with the data to deliver optimized preventative and predictive maintenance specific to their machines to improve machine uptime.”

When customers require after-sales service, they expect their problem to be solved with minimum delay. Too many service calls require expensive and time-consuming on-site visits. Thus, equipment providers require remote access to monitor and assist with user operations to troubleshoot problems, resolve service events and monitor preventative maintenance tasks, all without leaving their office.

With MachineMetrics Service, any machine maker or distributor can improve their customer service by resolving machine problems without the necessity of an on-site visit. Service managers and technicians can remotely monitor, manage, diagnose and resolve customer’s machine issues for any piece of connected equipment in the field and in real-time using MachineMetrics cellular edge device. The historical and real-time machine data collected allows equipment manufacturers to gain insight into customers’ equipment health and condition, identify new service opportunities with analytics and reporting, predict and deliver early warning of potential equipment failures, highlight elevated risk areas that lead to machine downtime, or even determine to take preventative action before it impacts a customer’s machine performance.

How it works is actually quite simple: Any equipment provider, OEM or distributor, can install MachineMetrics Edge device on a new machine sold to a customer or retrofit any machine currently in the field. MachineMetrics Edge has the ability to connect to the machine’s PLC and any additional sensors into the electrical cabinet of the machine and allows for the data to be shared with the equipment provider. There’s no need to install on customer’s internal IT infrastructure as MachineMetrics Edge comes with included cellular support. Once installed, the provider can add the device to a list of machine assets accessible via the MachineMetrics Service app and associate that machine with the location of the customer. Once the customer receives the machine and powers it on, that machine will appear active on the provider’s list of assets.

Encrypted data is then streamed to the secure MachineMetrics cloud where the data is structured and aggregated to enable visualizations and analytics for service teams to monitor. Access to the historical and real-time data is available through open APIs. Real-time dashboards, historical analysis, and integrations with other systems can be built with these APIs.

The MachineMetrics analytics engine will monitor any connected machine’s conditions and other manufacturing data points and initiate an action, such as text notifications when a monitor is triggered such as an alarm state, a limit being exceeded, or any other anomaly in the machine’s health is detected. A rules engine is provided for deploying monitors based on machine condition data and patent pending advanced machine learning algorithms can be deployed for detecting anomalous behavior.

Using this data, equipment service providers can notify machine operators to change a tool before it breaks or even notify maintenance managers when an anomaly is detected that could lead to a breakdown. This ability can prevent thousands of dollars of equipment replacement costs and days of downtime, not to mention unearth new service opportunities that were never visible to service teams before.

Data from thousands of connected machines allow the MachineMetrics Data Science team to work with service teams to identify trends and develop standard preventative maintenance and repair schedules that benefit both the service team and the customers. So while service teams are focusing on addressing issues that may immediately impact their customers, MachineMetrics is keeping an eye on big-picture issues that benefit both the equipment provider and the end-user.

OEM’s are already experiencing the benefits of implementing MachineMetrics Service: “Tsugami/Rem Sales is thrilled to be working with MachineMetrics, bringing cutting edge, disruptive technology directly into our end-users’ businesses,” explained Michael Mugno, Vice President, Tsugami/Rem Sales. “The addition of MachineMetrics Service to our Swiss-turn machine platform packages allows users to collect data on machine health, production status, downtime, and so much more that they may never have known existed - bettering businesses across the industry.”  

MachineMetrics Service will be on display at next week’s International Manufacturing Technology Show in Chicago, the world's largest manufacturing trade show, in the MachineMetrics booth (East Building, Level 3, Booth #133108).