Mobilised
Ace Micromatic Group offers a range of after-sales services for ancillaries through the Micromatic 360 suite.
Micromatic 360
Machining processes have come off age. Preventive maintenance and timely upgrades have turned more crucial to meet the pressing needs of ondemand machining. The need of the hour is to ensure longevity and thereby uptime. Maintenance downtimes or outages are required to be managed more efficiently too. To cater to a wide range of such customer needs, the Ace Micromatic Group (AMG) launched the Micromatic 360. A full solutions suite, it is claimed to be well equipped to meet needs from product commissioning to the end of lifecycle. “With Micromatic 360, customers need not seek out different service providers or even different departments within the same company,” states Narendra R, National Head - Strategic Services Business, Micromatic Machine Tools Pvt. Ltd. According to Narendra, who has spearheaded the conceptualisation and launch of Micromatic 360, it is a first-in-segment offering. “We are the only one in the Indian machining landscape and we are leaving no stone unturned to offer our customers a complete solution which is rare,” he claimed. Micromatic 360 is aimed at eliminating redundancies involved in the conventional way of maintaining multiple touchpoints.
With the automotive sector dominating its customer demography, AMG caters to select segments like medical and defence too. It meets turning, milling and product finishing, grinding requirements besides catering to CNC machines popular with auto component manufacturers.
Promising a 10-year lifespan on an average, Narendra draws attention to the customers being served well by their machines, some aged 15! A national warehouse for spares and their fast delivery is an added advantage for the company. In all, through Micromatic 360, AMG offers services at 55 plus locations across the world as a testimony to the ease of customers accessibility. The deal is sweetened through discounted offers. Customised plans, for instance, in machine calibration, on turning and machining centres, annual maintenance contracts and an offer on spares and kits were on offer recently.
End-to-end services
AMG end to end services are designed for a 360-degree approach. Delivered with a dedicated team of experienced, machine-tool engineers, the suite also encompasses reconditioning and retrofits, up-gradation, machine calibration, automation, validation for refurbished machines apart from other add-ons. Through the Annual Maintenance Contract (AMC) provision, AMG undertakes constant State-of-Health (SoH) monitoring. Through measurements and big-data analysis, customers can look forward to corrective and preventive actions from the company’s side. Regular lubrication, record maintenance and analysis, staff training, inventory planning and handling of wear and tear are part of the suite. For instance, AMG has set up professionally managed stores with well-equipped and trained personnel in partshandling with a sound knowledge on dealing with criticality and inventory management through the movement analysis. Through machine calibration and alignment, explains Narendra, AMG enhances machine reliability thereby improving delivery of precision, tolerance, wear parts spotting, lowering rejection rate, and risk management in accordance with the ISO 9001 standard.
Equipped to offer onsite as well as remote servicing, AMG is especially focussed on maintaining a state where customers are assured of a best in category resale value. “The suite through the preventive maintenance cycles and up-gradation offerings, extracts optimum performance and thereby elevates the machine value itself,” Narendra asserts. The up-gradation of the machine involves a robust evaluation process. In stage one, the machines are analysed and solutions are recommended. Hardware up-gradation is undertaken and top-ups like product reliability upgrade kits are offered. On the software front, upgrades tackle logic, tool life, tool monitoring and safety upgrades including on the humanmachine interface are carried out.
Machine tool manufacturers, mentioned Narendra, are open to trying out new age solutions like automatic loading and unloading. Known to reduce fatigue and reduce cycle time, these are aimed at helping increase productivity. AMG offerings in this domain enable complete machining in a single setup according to Narendra. “It saves cost and cycle time, avoids component rejection and reduces manual errors,” he mentioned. Through the Ace ‘Value’ option, AMG offers services like buyback, sell and lease-cum-sale of the used machines. Confident of demand growing for such value-additions, Narendra expressed hope of such offerings gaining momentum among customers. Other services include in foundation and electrical, machine and sub-system painting, machine reliability - analytics and reconfirmation, product financing and value services backed by a hassle-free process.
Customer-centric approach
With over 60 service centres, over 200 products and more than 60,000 installations, AMG has a customercentric approach. Converting design concepts into working products to especially suit Indian requirements at an affordable valuation, a CRM software forms the backbone of connectivity across all touchpoints. With in-house casting and fabrication shops, and completely indigenous technology sans foreign collaborations, Narendra calls the group the largest machine tool group in India. Speaking of the need to be agile, Narendra also shared challenges that need to be overcome on a daily basis. “We find that customers have unreasonable expectations from services and they opt for freelance servicemen which is again a big challenge. As a result they also end up paying higher and are prone to facing service-oriented problems,” he adds.
A positive trend from the pandemic, according to Narendra has been the shift from capex to opex considerations. It has played a catalyst in generating a greater demand for after-sales compared to a new purchase. Confident of the new services offered through Micromatic 360 boosting demand, Narendra avers, “We offer machines for rent, lease and leasecum-sale options through Micromatic 360 and sometimes these offerings turn into a sale when the customers are happy with our machines and see that it is beneficial in the long run.” “There are not many competitors who offer a comprehensive package like AMG and Micromatic 360, which is a definite plus for customers,” he mentions. AMG is positioning the Micromatic 360 suite with all its capabilities to its core customer universe from the MSME.