Top Predictive Maintenance Software Companies
Predictive maintenance companies are essential pillars of Industry 4.0—a new stage of the manufacturing industry built on intelligent solutions and automation. Still, these technologies only became a practical reality a decade ago. We are still seeing new players emerging within the predictive maintenance scene—leaders, laggards, and those in between.
Predictive maintenance integrates hardware and software, creating an intelligent facility, one that is proactive rather than reactive. Because predictive maintenance companies are innovative, transformative, and newly emergent, finding the right solution for your organization will require research.
What Are Predictive Maintenance Companies and Why Are They So Popular?
“In the environment of Industry 4.0, maintenance should do much more than merely preventing downtimes of individual assets. Predicting failures via advanced analytics can increase equipment uptime by up to 20%.”—The Deloitte Analytics Institute.
Predictive maintenance companies are a new breed of maintenance solution providers, using data and analytics to prevent downtime. By understanding how your equipment is performing and will perform in the future, you can take steps to avoid or mitigate issues, increasing uptime and operations profitability.
For many organizations, the goal has always been predictive maintenance. In the past, this has been achieved by calculating metrics using paper logs, spreadsheets, and traditional computerized maintenance management systems (CMMS).
In the past few years, there have been three critical breakthroughs in CMMS technology that have allowed for greater intelligence and automation, which are:
- High-quality, easy to deploy, and affordable Internet of things (IoT) sensors.
- Ubiquitous 5G connections with lower latency and faster speeds.
- Machine learning artificial intelligence (AI).
There are extraordinary benefits to a well-managed predictive maintenance solution. But just as every company has unique maintenance needs, they also need the right maintenance suite.
So today, we will review the top predictive maintenance companies, the software they have developed, and our recommendations for the best one for your business.
The Top Predictive Maintenance Software Companies |
The Top Predictive Maintenance Software Companies
Predictive maintenance is still a new enough industry that doesn’t have its own Gartner’s Magic Quadrant. Still, many big players within the CMMS industry have started to build predictive maintenance into their platforms.
Let’s explore the top predictive maintenance software companies of the year.
LLumin
LLumin is a software company that specializes in advanced computerized maintenance management systems (CMMS) and enterprise asset management (EAM) software solutions for businesses in a variety of industries. LLumin’s CMMS+, their flagship product, is a comprehensive software solution with advanced features such as condition-based monitoring, predictive maintenance, inventory management, work order management, and asset tracking.
One of the primary benefits of LLumin’s CMMS+ is its mobile-ready, cloud-based platform for centralizing maintenance information and providing real-time data and insights into maintenance operations. The software’s predictive maintenance features allow organizations to predict equipment failures before they occur, saving money and time. Furthermore, it enables businesses to streamline and improve their MRO inventory management processes in order to further reduce costs.
Pro: Mobile-ready, cloud-based, advanced predictive maintenance and real-time insights, fast implementation process, continued customer support
Con: Cloud-based, monthly subscription fees
Siemens
Siemens has integrated its products and services with a new cloud-based predictive maintenance solution alongside predictive maintenance consulting. In June 2022, Siemens announced the acquisition of Senseye, a leading provider of AI-powered solutions for industrial machine performance, broadening its portfolio in the field of innovative predictive maintenance and asset intelligence. The following month, Siemens announced the recent acquisition of Brightly Software, a leading software-as-a-service (SaaS) provider of asset and maintenance management solutions.
Siemens has made strategic moves to provide competitive predictive services for drive systems and cloud-based consulting solutions for individual applications. Siemens is ideal if you want a custom-built predictive maintenance solution for a production line—with the understanding that it will be an expensive, custom solution.
Pro: State-of-the-art predictive maintenance for production lines and drive systems
Con: Expensive, custom-built solutions by an industry leader
IBM
IBM’s Maximo Application Suite provides predictive maintenance analytics, improving asset reliability with data from IoT sensors, historical information, IT systems, and Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) systems. Predictive models utilize IBM’s revolutionary IBM Watson Machine Learning Technology, providing in-depth health and monitoring data in real time. IBM’s Maximo Application Suite is comprehensive and well-built, with a single caveat: It can be challenging to deploy, configure, and learn.
Pro: Best-in-class predictive maintenance powered by IBM Watson Machine Learning
Con: A severe learning curve in deployment and configuration, along with assumed expertise
ABB
ABB is a well-known player within the reliability and lifecycle management industry. Regarding predictive analytics, ABB focuses primarily on motors, generators, and drives. For these industries, it provides an excellent out-of-the-box solution for maintenance and management.
ABB combines visual inspections, condition monitoring, and life expectancy analysis to create reliable failure predictions. However, it only operates within its niche and is primarily beneficial for companies wanting to retrofit their existing motor, generator, and drive technologies.
Pro: An excellent predictive maintenance solution for motors, generators, and drives
Con: A fairly specific niche that still relies significantly on manually reported data
GE Predix
GE Predix is an industrial IoT platform, initially built with GE and then spun off into its own solution. GE Predix offers a suite of cutting-edge software solutions from the very edge (machine-level sensors) to integrated applications. It’s easy to implement, easy to scale, and easy to upgrade, with one catch—it can be challenging to customize. Some customers likened GE Predix to a “black box” of data.
Pro: An industrial IoT platform backed by incredibly strong end-to-end technology
Con: A lack of customization that can make it hard to integrate into some systems
Emerson
Emerson provides predictive maintenance solutions for field devices and rotational equipment—a specific niche in which it is a big player. They utilize an easy-to-use, at-a-glance dashboard for field devices and rotational equipment. With a single dashboard, you can see real-time data regarding your system’s performance. At the same time, Emerson’s AMS Machine Works solution is held back by its niche applications.
Pro: A great one-stop-shop for the management of field devices and rotational equipment
Con: Only available for field devices and rotational equipment
Fiix
Flix by Rockwell Automation provides work order management, asset management, inventory management, analytics, reporting, and mobile maintenance, all backed by AI-powered technology. It’s considered one of the top end-to-end maintenance management solutions, ideal for everything from factory applications to corporate IT systems. Flix promotes complete visibility into the system for both stakeholders and technicians.
Pro: A versatile and comprehensive AI-powered asset management solution
Con: Reports are not as comprehensive as the product’s feature set, non-robust parts management feature set, and the system can be slow
Upkeep
Upkeep is a cloud-based, highly mobile computerized management maintenance system intended for use throughout a multitude of industries, mainly on mobile devices. Upkeep supports work order management, chat and collaboration, invoice creation, image annotation, signature capture, and a variety of other feature-complete solutions that make it perfect for those who want an easy, simple way to track their assets.
Pro: An easy, out-of-the-box solution for upkeep, management, and maintenance
Con: Mobile applications still have a few glitches
eMaint
eMaint is a well-integrated CMMS that boasts API connections to Grainger, Microsoft Dynamics, Oracle, SAP, Sage Software, and more. This CMMS solution can be used for management, maintenance, work order management, and asset reporting. eMaint is lauded for being an easy, feature-complete solution, but it can be hard to customize for an organization. Support may be needed for more complex tasks.
Pro: A CMMS solution that can integrate easily into the rest of your tech stack
Con: A little complicated to implement and customize. UI navigation is less than ideal
Limble
Limble is a mobile maintenance solution that focuses on calming the chaos. It is user-friendly and provides an extraordinary breadth of features to encompass most industries, applications, and assets. Customers enjoy how easy it is to use and deploy. However, its mobile-first build does require the use of iOS and Android devices.
Pro: An all-around great CMMS that checks a lot of boxes
Con: Requires iOS or Android mobile devices
How to Choose the Best Predictive Maintenance Software for Your Business
There are a lot of options. The best predictive maintenance software for your business is the one that meets your specific needs. You’ll need to consider your organization’s size, budget, industry, and goals to find the right solution.
Key factors include:
- IoT support – All predictive maintenance software should be able to connect to and collect data from IoT machine-level sensors.
- Industry support – Your predictive maintenance company should have experience within your industry and similar installations.
- Machine learning/AI technology – Older predictive maintenance solutions simply used algorithms and software models—they were good for the time but are no longer the best. You need a system that will grow with and learn from you.
- Integrations – Your predictive maintenance software should integrate with your current CMMS, ERP, and other business systems—or provide it all in one box.
- Scalability – As your company grows, you’ll need a platform to grow with you. Today, cloud solutions are almost essential.
- Support – 24/7 support is essential for any mission-critical software.
LLumin’s CMMS+ meets all these requirements and more.
Why Should You Choose LLumin’s CMMS+?
While there are many emerging predictive maintenance software companies on the market, LLumin is innovative, transformative, and has a proven solution built on integrating systems and software that create a truly intelligent facility or plant—one that is proactive rather than reactive. LLumin differentiates itself in three unique areas:
- The ability to improve asset reliability with data from IoT sensors, machine control systems, and many other sources.
- Predictive models that provide in-depth health monitoring in real-time, along with pre-built rules that trigger smart JIT actions and outcomes.
- Advanced analytics utilities that are easy for non-IT personnel to configure and monitor—from any mobile device.
We are the only vendor in the predictive maintenance category that can go well beyond preventing downtimes of individual assets predicting failures via sensor-based technologies and advanced analytics, increasing uptime by up to 20%.
So, if you are looking for an all-in-one cutting-edge CMMS+ solution with top-notch customer service, LLumin is the perfect fit.
Getting Started With LLumin
LLumin develops innovative CMMS software to manage and track assets for industrial plants, municipalities, utilities, fleets, and facilities. Of all the predictive maintenance companies on this list, many businesses are turning to LLumin’s best-in-class CMMS+ software. If you’re interested in learning more, we encourage you to schedule a free demo or contact the experts at LLumin to see how our CMMS+ software can help you reach your efficiency and cost-cutting goals.
Ed Garibian, founder, and CEO of LLumin Inc., is an experienced executive and entrepreneur with demonstrated success building award-winning, growth-focused software companies. He has an impressive track record with enterprise software and entrepreneurship and is an innovator in machine maintenance, asset management, and IoT technologies.