Many manufacturers have started to make benefits of their products available to end customer through a service agreement. For example, instead of selling aircraft engines, aircraft manufacturers are now paid by the number of flight hours enabled by the engines. The business model changes from manufacturer to solution provider. Such new business models start with an innovation process that spans beyond product and includes operational services – often linking directly into processes delivered by partners.

With SAP PLM, you can involve service and maintenance in product development, innovation and management processes. SAP PLM helps you to:

• Maintain and update maintenance manuals, product documentation, maintenance, repair, and service records and histories, and configurations for products and systems of multiple companies.
• Define and manage processes specifically focused at handling claims and warranty activities.
• Manage the physical assets – buildings and facilities – of an organization for manufacturing, processing, or operations. The asset management capabilities of SAP PLM focus on configuration management for assets rather than products

For a more detailed overview on the service process support see the SAP PLM business maps.

With SAP PLM, you gain these service benefits:

• More revenue per product (product plus value add service)
• Being able to offer better business models to customers (value based differentiation)
• Reduce operating costs and increase efficiency with improved asset and maintenance management