• Success Stories

The Transformative Power of ClearOps: The AGCO Case Study

William Barkawi 20 Sep 2024 3 mins read
The AGCO Case Study

The ClearOps platform guarantees machine uptime by ensuring parts and service availability across the entire service supply chain. By uniting OEMs, dealers, and field machines on our platform, we harness data-driven insights to ensure seamless global collaboration, leading to superior local availability and uptime.

Who We Worked With

AGCO is a global leader in the design, manufacturer, and distribution of agricultural machinery and precision agricultural technology. Its brands include Fendt, Massey Ferguson, Valtra, Challenger, and many more.

The Challenges

AGCO faced several pressing issues, including a lack of visibility into the inventories and sales of its ~2,000 dealers and distributors, and how well these partners were serving end customers after they purchased a machine. This gap in oversight was particularly problematic because aftersales services are not only the
most profitable part of an OEM’s business but also crucial for maintaining customer loyalty and encouraging
repeat business.

Without clear visibility, it was hard to accurately plan parts production and analyze key metrics like customer satisfaction, loyalty, and parts sales. Dealers, on the other hand, had to deal with a variety of manual processes for parts planning, warranty claims, and service fulfillment, often using different systems. This lack of integration between AGCO and its dealers led to increased manual work, decreased parts availability, more frequent machine downtimes, and ultimately, a loss of customers.

Both AGCO and its dealers found that machine downtime often came as a surprise. Their shared goal was to shift from a reactive to becoming a proactive provider of superior aftersales services, in line with AGCO’s “Farmer First” strategy.

The Solution

The ClearOps platform unites OEMs, dealers, and machines on a single, integrated platform to maximize machine uptime. By harmonizing the entire service supply chain, ClearOps provides the critical data and collaboration needed to ensure global parts and service availability.

For AGCO, this integration delivered unprecedented visibility and control over their dealer parts network. They could now see exactly what was needed, anticipate future requirements, and tap into untapped sales and service opportunities. This transformation led to a significant increase in part fill rates by 43% and part sales by 15%.

Dealers also reaped the benefits with sophisticated planning tools, automated parts ordering, and proactive updates on upcoming service needs. This seamless system integration and automation drastically reduced manual efforts, boosted parts availability and sales by 43% and 15%, respectively, and ensured timely machine servicing, all contributing to enhanced machine uptime.

And all of this was achieved without replacing existing systems. Instead, ClearOps was introduced as a metaplatform, seamlessly connecting and leveraging all available systems to maximize their potential.

Solution Overview:

  • Integration Technology: Our Connector Technology effortlessly integrates with OEM systems, Dealer DMS systems, and machine telematics solutions. It transforms disparate data into a unified, actionable software foundation, ensuring seamless collaboration along the service supply chain.
  • Parts Planning: Using neural networks and advanced planning algorithms, our end-to-end parts planning delivers exceptional accuracy, ensuring the right parts are available when and where they are needed.
  • Automation: Beyond just data integration, our platform operationalizes data, facilitating end-to-end order processing. Orders are seamlessly sent to OEM systems and automatically registered in Dealer DMS systems, reducing manual workload and streamlining operations.
  • Field Service Management: Our robust field service management solution, enriched with OEM IoT and service profile data, enables dealers to efficiently plan and execute their workshop activities and manage their technician teams, enhancing service delivery and efficiency.
  • Advanced Analytics: The ClearOps advanced analytics hub provides deep insights into customer lifetime value. It analyzes global machine behavior and sales data, uncovering hidden sales opportunities even beyond the warranty period, helping OEMs and dealers to maximize revenue and satisfaction.

The Transformative Impact

Our solution has significantly narrowed the gap between dealer and customer fill rates, boosting customer satisfaction and sales. Highlights of our achievements include:

  • A rise in part sales by 15% due to improved forecasting and inventory management
  • An increase in parts availability from about 65% to 86%, reducing repair times
  • A 9% decrease in non-moving inventory, cutting working capital needs by 20%
  • Dealers saving hours weekly, allowing more customer engagement
  • Reduction in emergency orders and manual labor
  • Enhancing overall efficiency and data quality for strategic decisions

AGCO’s proactive stance in maximizing the solution’s business value has been recognized with multiple innovation awards, marking a significant leap in operational excellence and customer satisfaction.

Next Steps

If you are interested in achieving new levels of visibility, efficiency, and profitability across your aftersales operations, like AGCO, please fill out the form below to book a demo with us. 

William Barkawi

William Barkawi

William is a highly-enthusiastic Aftersales Expert and Entrepreneur. He started founding his own software businesses when he was 15 and continued to pursue entrepreneurial activities throughout his studies at Technical University Munich. After graduating with a degree in economics and engineering, William worked for companies operating in the supply chain environment before he founded ClearOps to tackle his vision of "keeping the world of machinery moving".

More articles like this

retail inventory management
  • ClearBlog

Retail Inventory Management: Key Practices for Optimizing Your Inventory 

Retail inventory management is a critical aspect of running a successful retail business. It involves managing the goods a business holds in stock to meet customer demand without overstocking or understocking.
efficient spare parts management
  • ClearBlog

Efficient Spare Parts Management is Crucial – Here are Tips on How OEMs Can Optimize It

Spare parts management is more than a back-end OEM priority; it has major implications in the real world. With the right practices and technologies, dealers and OEMs can work together to ensure part availability
Dealer Inventory Management
  • ClearBlog

Visibility: the Core Element of Dealer Inventory Management

Inventory management is a critical component of any heavy equipment OEM’s business, especially when it comes to spare parts components which typically have to be available at any given moment. However, this is easier said than done. Having the right parts at the right time in the right place to ensure high fill-rates and limited downtime requires a lot of connectivity and visibility.
Linkedin
Copyright © 2023 ClearOps GmbH. All rights reserved.