What the IoT Means For the Service Industry
First there were the yellow pages. Your washing machine would break down, and you would take hours to find a technician that could work with your specific model of machine. Then you would wait for him to turn up and realize he doesn’t have the parts necessary to fix your machine. So it would take you another two weeks until he got the part. Then he would miss the appointment and until you finally got the machine fixed, you have not only run out patience but you have also run out of clothes.
Then came the miracle of the cloud, a flourishing boom that has already revolutionized the service industry massively. Companies like ServiceMax and ClickSoftware have taken the process and cut it down significantly. You are able to schedule an appointment with a local engineer, who will arrive at a time that is easily scheduled on his iPad (or other mobile device), and that has an application of the aforementioned companies. Additionally, if the engineers comes and find that they don’t have the correct parts, they can use the application to locate another local engineer who does. More often than not the problem is fixed within the first couple of days of your initial call.
However, there are still some people that feel this wasn’t enough. Companies like Evrythng are pushing the web-of-things (most commonly know as the internet-of-things) in much the same way that traditional CRM cloud platforms have been pushed so far. With this model, every object will be fitted with a chip that is connected to the internet. It will receive its own unique internet profile that will automatically alert you and update information as needed. So, for the example of the washing machine, you will be alerted that the machine is broken by the machine itself. It will be able then tell you what needs to be replaced, and even recommend local registered engineers that not only have the parts to fix it, but also have the available appointments suited around your schedule.
