Designed to Optimize Technician Workflow, VC-Backed UpKeep's CMMS "Takes the Work Out of Work Orders" [New Podcast]
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In this week's episode of the Thomas Industry Update Podcast, Thomas CMO Shawn Fitzgerald talks to CEO and founder of Upkeep Ryan Chan, a chemical engineer and production process professional. Upkeep, a CMMS solution that recently secured a Series B funding round of $36 million, helps industrial businesses maintain safety and maximize uptime from a convenient mobile device.
Chan uses an effective anecdote in describing Upkeep's contribution to the industrial space. "We take the work out of work orders," he explains. "Essentially, what we want to do is make the days, lives, and jobs easier for field technicians."
Focusing Product Development on the End-user
Not only does UpKeep focus on making life easier for field technicians, but the entire system was designed with those users in mind. Chan explains that although the software will likely be purchased by upper-level management, it's built specifically for the needs of technicians.
"The core premise was we're going to build a solution for the technicians because we saw that [our] competitors were selling beautiful reports and dashboards, but they didn't have the data to back it up – because there was no adoption among the technicians, the end-users," Chan says. "So, we flipped that around. We said we're going to start with technicians because they're the source of data, and we very deliberately did not start with the VP of Operations [or] the C-level execs in mind. Instead, we basically said we're going to build for the technicians and make sure they have the best experience."
Simplifying Safety in the Workplace
With the onslaught of strict new safety measures for industrial workplaces in light of COVID-19, managing safety in the workplace became increasingly complicated almost overnight. To support its users in navigating the confusing new regulations, Chan explains that Upkeep added a diverse COVID-19 resource library to help industrial business leaders figure out the changes they'll need to implement and the data they'll need to track in their operations.
"What we saw from every single one of our customers is that they're dealing with the same thing: 'How do I safely reopen our facility?' And 'How do I safely operate our facility during a global pandemic?'" Chan explains. "We wanted to help. We've compiled a list of over 100 different checklists and audits for safely reopening your facility during COVID-19. It's a super-simple library that you can search [based on your facility type] and download the correct checklist, import it into UpKeep, and start running your audits and compliance out of UpKeep on a daily, weekly, [or] monthly basis."
Staying Ahead with Industry 4.0
As CEO of a mobile software company, Chan is a big advocate for the future capabilities and diverse innovations of Industry 4.0. "Industry 4.0 is a fascinating revolution," he says. He encourages industrial businesses, both large and small, to educate themselves about the benefits that digital transformation can bring to their facilities.
Chan explains that businesses looking to get ahead of the adoption curve should focus on two components:
- Understanding the importance of the cloud
- Prioritizing the adoption of IoT
"Outside of just technology and having the cool, shiny new thing and more deployments, I really think that cloud is important because of [how it] really frees up [data storage and capabilities]. Now you can start encapsulating multiple, different data sources instead of having different silos of data and trying to export it out into an Excel spreadsheet and trying to merge the two," he says. "Because all the data is stored up in the cloud, you can run really interesting reports across finance, across production, across maintenance, across parts, and across procurement."
Chan believes IoT offers similar promise. "When people often think about IoT, it's actually not this whole brand-new thing. SCADA systems, PLCs, [those] have existed for decades," he explains. "For me, IoT... is just lowering the barrier of entry so that you can start remotely condition monitoring more equipment at a much lower cost."
Maintaining Safety and Efficiency with the Help of Industry 4.0
To learn more about Chan's advice for avoiding common pitfalls in industry 4.0 adoption and how industrial business leaders should get started with data collection and analysis for data-driven decision making, listen to the latest episode of the Thomas Industry Update Podcast, now available to stream on the following platforms:
Image Credit: Thomas Industry Update Podcast.
