Combilift boosts equipment uptime and customer service
NEW YORK – Sept, 2022 – Infor, the industry cloud company, recently announced that Combilift, the largest global manufacturer of multi-directional forklifts and a leading provider of long-load handling solutions, is using Infor Coleman AI-driven parts recommendations, in combination with Infor CloudSuite Industrial, to boost equipment uptime and customer service while increasing employee satisfaction.
Within 60 days of the solution being deployed, Combilift expects a 30% increase in first-time fixes, a 40% reduction in costs for service jobs, and a 30% increase in revenue per transaction.
“With new hires and less experienced staff in the parts department, we knew that there were missed revenue opportunities because of inaccurate quoting,” said Kenny Gilmore, global parts manager at Combilift. “For example, if someone wants a water pump, a trained employee knows to add a gasket. But a new hire would not, leaving the customer to go to another vendor to purchase a gasket. We are excited about the parts recommender getting smarter and smarter, so we can bring in more revenue while keeping our customers happy with a first-time fix.”
Combilift – with global headquarters in Monaghan, Ireland, and North American headquarters in Greensboro, N.C. – has 60,000 unique trucks in operation to meet its customers’ industry-specific needs. Managing this diverse set of trucks creates servicing complexities and requires expertise to accurately quote the right set of parts to ensure a first-time fix.
The company seized on the opportunity to leverage Infor Coleman AI, an integrated Infor platform technology service, with Infor CloudSuite Industrial, to further improve the customer and employee experience by having the AI system, utilizing three years of historical data, generate the right set of parts for service quotes. With Combilift continuing to grow rapidly, Coleman AI not only improves the efficiency and accuracy of recommending the right set of parts, it also scales the service quote process, reducing stress on staff and ensuring first-time fixes for customers.
“Our global parts department relied on a knowledge-based, manual process in determining the sum of parts needed to service a truck,” Gilmore said. “This approach is not always accurate and consistent, especially with less-experienced staff. With the global staff shortages, trying to recruit people who are already trained is quite difficult. But with Infor Coleman AI, we can train the system and, in turn, it can train us.”
The Infor Coleman AI parts recommendations are delivered directly in the parts estimator screen in Infor CloudSuite Industrial. In addition to enabling faster, more accurate quotes, the parts recommender is helping Combilift realize 30% faster completion of service jobs and helping employees determine related parts needed in a service request 75% faster (in 5 minutes, compared to 20 minutes previously). With Coleman AI, Gilmore said, employees are more productive and contribute to better customer outcomes.
Infor’s platform technology is foundational to Infor CloudSuite Industrial and extends the ERP (enterprise resource planning) system with integrated services such as AI, Data Lake, analytics and Infor homepages. In addition to leveraging Coleman AI to help make processes more efficient and accurate for the parts department, Combilift is using Infor homepage services to deliver more efficiency and accuracy to the production department responsible for production KPIs (key performance indicators).
Going forward, Combilift’s global IT manager, Fearghal McCorriston, says one of the company’s key initiatives will be vendor performance tracking with Infor Coleman AI to improve the supply chain – making sure parts arrive on time to meet growing production schedules.
