Concepts and IT-methods for the supporting services in the machine tool industry

Many companies from the machine tool industry consider the service for their machines and facilities to be merely a means of enhancing their customer's satisfaction. The opportunity to establish those services as a highly profitable business unit is often seized only to a small extent. In order to fully exploit the respective potential a systematic approach in developing technical services is required (Service Engineering). This article is a contribution in the field of modularization of services that generate added value for customer-specific machine tools. An appropriate concept for structuring services is a prerequisite for their successful development and implementation.