Overview
As the nation’s water supplier, Mekorot services the entire Israeli population, numbering some 8 million consumers. It is critical that the company keeps its equipment running at peak performance, 24/7.
Fieldbit has been instrumental in improving first-time fix rates of Mekorot’s highly complex and wide assortment of machines, accelerating fix times, streamlining maintenance and training procedures, and ultimately ensuring the safety and reliability of the 4 million cubic water supply output by Mekorot on a daily basis.
Business Needs
Mekorot employs several hundred field service teams consisting of electricians, mechanics and water experts who address problems and malfunctions that arise among literally hundreds of different types of equipment – from pumps to sensors to electronics and electrical systems – across more than 3,000 facilities nation-wide.
The team’s goal is to ensure that these hundreds of pieces of machinery run smoothly and properly at all times; and that this complex infrastructure is maintained with maximum uptime. When problems arise, they need to be repaired quickly and efficiently to ensure continual flow of healthy water to consumers.
Challenges
Challenges faced by the field services teams:
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- Many machine types mean many experts – The systems are comprised of hundreds of different complex machines, supplied by as many vendors. This requires the field services team to include professionals with several types of specific expertise.
- Diverse facilities mean specific, local experts – With more than 3,000 Mekorot facilities operating across the country, each built and renovated at different times and each featuring different types of machinery, each district requires a local field services team.
- Expertise has its limits – On any given day, a support engineer may be summoned to solve anything from the most routine issue to the most complex repair.
- Remote assistance – Remote assistance generally entails exchanging smartphone photos and explaining problems over the phone, an often frustrating and time-consuming process.
- Take-over fixing gap – There are continuity issues involved in swapping out field engineers and continuing repairs that were started by a different engineer.
- “Over-fixing” – Replacing parts unnecessarily, since replacing an entire part is often easier than locating and solving a specific problem.
- Dangers at the plant – The team works with high-voltage and chemical equipment, making safety a major concern.
- Training is expensive and time-consuming – Field engineers at Mekorot receive several years of training.
Solution
Fieldbit has revolutionized the way Mekorot conducts field services.
The combination of smart glasses and a mobile app platform enables any dispatched field engineer to receive crystal clear remote help at real-time from experts or vendors located anywhere in the world.
The quality of the assistance format far exceeds cellphone photos and phone calls. Augmented Reality (AR) lets the remote expert superimpose markings, messages, and diagrams directly onto the engineer’s field of view. Thanks to smart glasses, the engineer’s hands remain free to commit fixes simultaneously.
Fieldbit increases safety while working in potentially dangerous high-voltage and chemical machine environments.
The real-time view also makes remote diagnoses possible, and allows the service center to dispatch the exact parts needed for repair upon the first field call.
One of the best features of the system is that successful collaborations are recorded and cataloged, thus building a resource library of protocols for complex fixes that can be utilized by other field engineers.
Benefits
Fieldbit has made the Mekorot field services department significantly more efficient and effective. Fieldbit has:
- Increased first-time fix rates – Immediate resolution has been made possible, even for very uncommon or non-routine cases.
- Accelerated fixes – Direct remote communication between the expert and field engineer has effectively eliminated back and forth in the field, made site visits shorter and fixes faster.
- Saved time and money – More accurate diagnoses and singular site visits mean reduced equipment and labor costs.
- Easy to learn – The out-of-the-box system is intuitive and extremely easy to learn.
- Made site visits safer – Field engineers are never alone, which reduces the risk of mistakes.
- Provided peace of mind – to both supervisor and field technician.
- Made training easier – Creating a database of fixes performed has altered training procedures from long-term to short-term mentorship.
The Bottom Line
Since implementing Fieldbit in 2016, Mekorot has successfully:
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Reduced machine downtime
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Reduced machine fix-time
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Saved time on service call dispatches
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Saved on equipment costs due to more accurate diagnoses
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Shaved time off of training periods
Looking Ahead
Mekorot intends to implement the system in other departments such as electricity, quality and operations, in addition to field services. “In every department, we have ideas for new applications” says Alon Shpinger, WaTech® Engineering Department, Mekorot.
About Fieldbit
Fieldbit, founded in 2013, is an out-of-the-box enterprise solution that utilizes augmented reality (AR) to revolutionize complex equipment repair field services. The system – which combines SaaS Knowledge Capture and Distribution platform, smart glasses and smartphones – enables secure, real-time, hands-free visual collaboration between the site engineer and remote expert on machinery fixes, and accumulates a proprietary library of successful solutions for future field application. Fieldbit accelerates fix times, reduces the need for site visits, boosts first-time fix rates, and streamlines maintenance and training procedures for complex equipment repair services. Fieldbit is based in Israel, with offices in Uden, Netherlands and Rockville, USA.
About Mekorot
Mekorot supplies approximately 80% of the drinking water and 70% of the total amount of water consumed in Israel. In numbers, this represents approximately 1.5 billion cubic meters of water supplied each year.
