Every field service organization or complex equipment manufacturer uses a parts catalog to support the maintenance and repair of their products after the sale. Some parts catalogs are electronic, some are integrated, and a few are still rocking it old school with paper based systems. But no matter what level of parts catalog adoption is being employed, it’s a universal truth that complex equipment doesn’t get maintained or repaired without accurate, current and proper service and parts information.

Throughout 2012, Enigma has followed a number of complex equipment industries to understand the challenges and successes in leveraging service and parts catalog technology. Increasingly, parts catalogs and extended service libraries are becoming an integral component of aftermarket service, knowledge bases, and customer support efforts.  From automotive aftermarket service and parts to medical device field service and OEM/dealer relationships, parts catalog technology is heating up discussions and moving maintenance and field service onto center stage.

Our readers have read, shared and commented on a number of Enigma’s electronic parts catalog (EPC) related blog posts this year. We’ve listed our most popular articles here just in case you missed them. Please take a moment to read through the best of our 2012 posts, and share your own thoughts and opinions in the comments section.

As we move into 2013 we invite you to subscribe to our blog via email or RSS to stay up to date on next year’s hot topics in parts catalogs.

1. Service Contracts that Sell Themselves — How Medical Device OEMs Can Gain a Competitive Edge in Field Service
2. How Cars are Like CAT Scan Machines — What the Medical Device Industry Can Learn from Automotive Manufacturing
3. Helping Field Service Technicians in Offline Mode
4. 3 Things Mechanics Know About Your Parts Catalog That You Don't
5. Field Service 2012 — Technology to Improve Service Execution and Increase Profits
6. E-Commerce Heats Up Discrete Manufacturing -- A Gartner Report
7. Fewer Mechanics Fixing Harder Problems
8. The Ride of a Lifetime: Medical Equipment Manufacturing, Service, Maintenance and Repair
9. OEM/Dealer Relationships — How the Right EPC Can Help or Hurt
10. Parts Catalog Helps Parts & Service Staff Cross Sell and Up Sell

2012 was an interesting year in aviation and aerospace. Soaring fuel prices threatened the stability of the airline industry as well as the MRO service companies that support it.  The FAA officially entered the debate over accessibility of instructions for continued airworthiness (ICA) while some aviation OEMs continued to push for restricting access to service and parts information.

Airlines increasingly started looking to MRO IT systems to fully automate their Engineering & Maintenance (E&M) systems so they could leverage highly important maintenance and repair information as a service asset. And tablets, the ultimate symbol of mobility, dominated discussions at nearly every aviation service event, leaving many wondering how mobility will impact the future of aviation maintenance repair and overhaul.

Enigma followed the aviation and aerospace maintenance and repair stories throughout the year, giving our take on topics we feel are important to the industries and customers we serve. The following articles are our most popular MRO-related blog posts of the year. We hope you enjoy the sampling of posts and encourage you to share your opinions, whether you agree or disagree, in the comments.

We’re looking forward in 2013 to seeing how this year’s issues unfold and what new trends and topics emerge.

1. Boeing Plans to Exploit Maintenance Data – More Bad News for Airlines?
2. OEMs Driving Up Aircraft Maintenance Costs – What Will They Say at MRO Americas?
3. Safety Held Hostage? – FAA Enters the Debate
4. SAP User Group (SUGAIR) Dives into S1000D, PDF and Tablets
5. OEM Information Policies Increase Costs at FedEx (and Create a Tornado of Complaints at MRO Americas 2012)
6. Clouding the Issue of PLM's Role in MRO and Social Media
7. Is Social Media Relevant in Service and Maintenance Operations?
8. The Ultimate MRO IT System (as defined by Aircraft Commerce)
9. Talking Up Tablets But Standards Are the Sticking Point – Report from ATA E-Business Forum
10. Korean Airlines Leverages Its Greatest Asset: Information – with Help from Oracle and Enigma

The Right to Repair initiative recently passed as law in Massachusetts creates a win-win-win-win (4X win) scenario for auto manufacturers, auto dealers, automobile owners, and independent repair facilities alike.

Auto Manufacturers
Auto manufacturers have a lot to gain from Right to Repair. Most notably, they have an opportunity to increase brand loyalty through improved customer satisfaction, improved reliability of their maintenance, service and parts information, and a new layer of dealer support.

Customer Loyalty. According to the National Business Research Institute (NBRI), “Customer loyalty is important because it drives increased same-store sales. Customer service drives intent to return. Intent to return is the measurable indicator of future same-store sales.”

That means that positive repeat customer service interactions have a direct correlation to customer loyalty. Buying a car or truck is only the beginning of a long-term relationship. And while OEMs have traditionally relied on their dealers to forge the all-important relationship of trust and loyalty with customers, Right to Repair now provides the single biggest reason for a customer to maintain a direct interaction with the OEM following an auto purchase.

As the primary source of maintenance and service information, OEMs are well positioned to establish new, more personal relationships with customers and offer additional information on accessories, recommended maintenance schedules or other topics that have real value.  

Reliability. OEMs are responsible for the accuracy and consistency of diagnostic and repair information. That information positively influences the customers’ experience with—and perception of—the brand.  Right to Repair encourages OEMs to have a direct conversation with customers, allowing for online feedback via electronic notes. That feedback improves product design and increases overall product reliability.

Dealer support. While dealers have a strong propensity to purchase authorized OEM aftermarket parts, DIY customers and independent repair shops may not share that same sense of brand loyalty. By authoring and managing their own information and interacting directly with customers and independent repair facilities, as Right to Repair suggests, OEMs are in a unique position to provide diagnostic guidance, and make parts and service recommendations.

Naturally, a recommendation to the closest authorized dealership supports the OEMs dealer network in a very direct and measurable way.

Auto Dealers
Authorized auto dealerships also benefit from Right to Repair by becoming the go-to source for DIY customers and independent repair shops for parts and extended service.  Recommendations from OEMs regarding parts needed to complete a repair help customers and independent repair facilities find reputable and reliable parts to complete the work.

OEM recommendations of where service work can be performed if the difficulty of the repair exceeds the customers’ or repair shops’ expertise also provide a high level of customer confidence that the OEM and its dealer network are committed to supporting the vehicle through the life of the auto.
 
Automobile Owners
For a long time car owners have been driving in the dark, endlessly searching the internet chat rooms and forums for tidbits of automotive information or blindly relying on the word of a mechanic or dealership as their sole source of maintenance wisdom. Right to Repair ensures that customers have direct access to reliable, authorized information they need to make informed maintenance and repair decisions for their vehicles.  

In many instances, OEMs are starting to respond to customer desires for more information access even without the mandate of Right to Repair.  In fact, some OEM brands are taking the opportunity to begin a personal, one-to-one relationship with car owners to make it easy to learn about and maintain their cars for the life of the vehicles.  Much in the way that Lowes Hardware is rolling out MyLowes.com, the MyLowes new "home asset management" website, auto OEMs like GM, Mopar (for all the Chrysler brands) and Enigma customer Ford, are gearing up to help customers track their cars' maintenance history and future needs with websites designed specifically for owners.   

Independent Repair Facilities
Right to Repair gives independent repair shops access to the information they need to service vehicles requiring technical diagnostic equipment to evaluate. This allows them to broaden the range of makes and models of vehicles they can work on, putting them on an even playing field with larger maintenance shops.

Right to Repair changes the dynamic of dealer/independent shop interactions to a more convivial one where independent repair shops search and find the repair and parts information from the OEM and are then directed to their local dealership to source the parts. Independent repair shops can become part of the feedback loop when they are encouraged to provide service and repair insights to the OEM. These insights help OEMs increase product reliability and ultimately help the small shop mechanic improve his/her repair. The feedback to the OEM from a professional mechanic decreases the mean time to repair as more users read and apply the documentation. The steps and instructions are improved as more people use the data.

In Right to Repair, we see an opportunity for OEMs to build stronger ties with customers and dealerships while opening new channels with independent repair shops.

Yes, but how will OEMs know their outreach to customer is increasing their loyalty?
Good intentions aside, can adherence to Right to Repair turn resistance into market opportunity?

Measuring success would be difficult without analytics, Big Data technology and business intelligence. Luckily, forerunners in service and parts catalog software like Enigma are introducing advances in reporting capability and trend spotting. Newly developed dashboard reporting tools capture and display electronic parts catalog activities and purchases, presenting them as easy-to-read charts that highlight pre-defined key performance indicators (KPIs).  

The InService EPC Dashboard provides OEMs with real-time, data-driven insights into their aftermarket. It adds a layer of business intelligence not found in other electronic parts catalog software. The Dashboard gives OEMs a strong competitive advantage when developing aftermarket service and sales strategies by identifying patterns in equipment repair, parts ordering and dealer, customer or independent repair facilities behavior.  

The Win-Win-Win-Win Recap
OEMs are happy because they now have a means to deliver information to help all participants in the vehicle maintenance process. They improve their customer loyalty in the process and support their dealer network through referrals.

Dealer are happy because they sold the parts to the independent shop and perhaps picked up some more complex service work that the small shop was not suited to complete. 

Customers are happy because their car or truck is fixed. Independent repair shops are happy because they are paid for service work and are able to broaden their base of makes and models that they can work on.