Powered Asset Tracking Case Study

Contract Maintenance Services for Forklift Fleet (Materials Handling)

Maximizing fleet efficiency and uptime; a partnership between NZ’s largest dairy producer and one of NZ oldest and largest equipment service providers.

Overview

Background

NZ’s largest dairy co-operative was looking for a contract maintenance supplier for a nationwide fleet of 600 forklifts across multiple warehouses and logistical centers. Our partner, one of NZ’s largest equipment suppliers and maintenance service providers wanted to provide a branded telematics service to support their client and to measure SLA performance via a shared telematics portal.

Challenges

Create a branded, custom telematics platform for SLA management of a contract maintenance agreement that enabled collaborative support for forklift maintenance between the service provider and the end client, one of NZ’s largest primary manufacturers and exporters.

Impact

Connected equipment supports contract maintenance services for a leading NZ manufacturer and ensures SLA delivery for one of NZ’s largest equipment service suppliers. Connected machine telematics for proactive maintenance management, breakdown alerts and customer SLA reporting.

The Problem

A nationwide equipment dealer (the service partner) wanted to win a contract maintenance agreement with a large manufacturer (the client).

The client maintains a fleet of 600 forklifts operating 24 hours a day across warehouse and distribution centres around the country. To bid for the maintenance contract, the service partner needed to meet specific Service Level Agreement (SLA) metrics and show that they were consistently meeting or surpassing these standards.

The service partner knew that they wanted to deliver this SLA monitoring via a combination of connected equipment (telematics) and a branded mobile app and SaaS portal.

Proactive Maintenance

A key driver for this approach was to pivot from reactive maintenance to proactive. This included:

  • Change equipment maintenance model from scheduled to operating runtime.
  • Support equipment contracts with enterprise customers by providing utilisation reporting and telematics services, including automated KPI reporting.
  • Improve customer service with tracked breakdown resolution reporting.
  • Reinforce customer satisfaction and loyalty with visibility into uptime and utilisation of equipment.
  • Create a competitive differentiator with connected machine services.

  • Lacking visibility and awareness of upcoming service requirements.
  • Inability to plan resources and gain efficiencies.
  • Constantly reacting to issues rather than “front-footing” customer’s service needs and proactively managing the customer and their equipment.
  • Lacking differentiation with customers for service delivery meant most customers judged the service provider on “their rates” rather than their overall service and brand values.
  • Unable to gain service efficiency, getting to the right place at the right time, with the right parts, first time every time. Often a single job required repeat visits to diagnose the problem, then retried the right parts or tools required and then complete the job. The ideal was attending and resolving the job in one visit.
  • How to work with and communicate issues with the clients materials handling team. How would breakdowns be reported and actioned? How to measure SLA performance?

The service partner is a nationwide equipment dealership offering new machine sales, equipment rental, parts and service. They are one of NZ’s top equipment dealers. Operating for more than 100 years, the service partner has a long and established history of supplying NZ businesses with industrial machinery and servicing with 18 branches around New Zealand. They sell and support new materials handling, construction, forestry, and environmental equipment across 20 manufacturer brands.

The service partner wanted to win a key new materials handling contract to supply forklifts to one of NZ’s largest companies (the client). As part of the supply contract, the client required a Service Level Agreement (SLA) with a wide range of Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) to be reported on monthly, including target uptime and availability, utilisation metrics, on-time planned maintenance and breakdown / downtime mitigation.

To meet the clients requirements, the service partner needed to implement machine telematics as well as a digital application to manage breakdowns and collaborate with the client’s warehouse staff.

The service partner chose to develop their own dedicated device to connect the forklift fleet and turned to an Auckland-based contract manufacturer to develop the hardware. They also made a make-vs-buy analysis to determine if they should develop their own telematics platform and mobile application or if there was a viable “off-the-shelf” solution available.

A key requirement of the “buy” approach was that the service partner wanted to establish their own brand of telematics as a value-added service for their customers and a differentiator in a competitive machinery sales market. Therefore, they needed a telematics platform that could be re-branded for their needs.

Lastly, the service provider needed a telematics platform provider that could integrate their tracking device as well as providing custom reporting tools to fulfil the client’s data visibility and SLA requirements. The service partner then turned to Blackhawk to help realise their vision – a branded, all-encompassing telematics and machine data platform.

The primary challenge presented by the client was to ensure maximum uptime of their forklift fleet, while simultaneously reducing costs associated with maintenance, equipment breakdowns, and operational inefficiencies. Furthermore, they wanted a system that could provide real-time data on usage, maintenance needs, and SLA compliance to make data-driven decisions for fleet optimisation.

The expectation placed on the service partner was to:

  1. Implement an unplanned maintenance support program to reduce forklift downtime and associated costs.
  2. Implement a planned maintenance programme to ensure that forklifts and machines are serviced on time.
  3. Ensure prompt resolution of machinery breakdowns to minimize disruption to Fonterra’s operations.
  4. Enhance overall fleet efficiency, safety, and performance.
  5. Provide robust SLAs to guarantee the quality and reliability of the fleet.

The Solution

Blackhawk’s proven white-label SaaS platform provided an ideal solution for the maintenance service provider, ticking multiple key requirements:

Custom white-label telematics platform (website and mobile app).

Branded, customer facing mobile application for triggering breakdown and non-urgent fault reporting, and account security to give the client oversight of their assets.

Integration of custom telematics device while also providing future-proof options for alternative hardware solutions if the need should arise.

Ability to raise alerts and reminders for planned equipment maintenance based on accurate monitoring of operating hours.

Custom breakdown / unplanned maintenance mobile app report which records username, timestamp, GPS location, breakdown description and photos.

QR code tagging of assets for identification.

Custom Power BI Embedded KPI reporting dashboards.

Automated workflows for breakdown notification and escalation to the correct branch, based on location.

Utilisation-based Service Schedules to trigger planned maintenance jobs, so that servicing can be carried out on time.

The Result/Benefits

Blackhawk’s white-label CAMPUS telematics solution (Central Asset Management Platform for Unified Services) enabled the service partner to win the materials handling supply and maintenance contract with the client and meet all of the wide-ranging requirements, from planned and unplanned maintenance to automated KPI reporting.

The data insights provided through connected forklift telematics has given the client the ability to understand:

Forklift utilisation across the entire fleet and at specific locations and time periods.

Realise where assets were over or under-utilised and redistribute resources to better support operational needs.

Right-size the fleet and create both better cost and operational efficiency.

Reduce equipment downtime and increase reliability.

Gain visibility of breakdown frequency and the service partner’s time to resolution.

Conclusion

The partnership between Blackhawk.io and the service partner demonstrates the benefits of leveraging advanced telematics and fleet management solutions in the materials handling industry. By providing the client with real-time data, preventative maintenance tools, and automated KPI reporting, they were able to significantly improve their forklift fleet operations, resulting in increased efficiency and cost savings. This case study serves as a prime example of how technology can be utilised to optimize business operations and drive better results.

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