Siemens Smart Infrastructure uses Dynamics 365 Field Service to reimagine experiences for employees, partners, and customers

With its headquarters in Zug, Switzerland, Siemens Smart Infrastructure underscores its brand with outstanding customer service. Until recently, a regionally distributed enterprise resource planning (ERP) system barred the economies of scale and global standardization that the company wanted to realize. Now with its Microsoft Dynamics 365 Field Service rollout, the company is bringing new value to both customers and users. 

Supporting the universe of products that make up Smart Infrastructure 

Siemens Smart Infrastructure provides customers with a comprehensive end-to-end portfolio from a single source—with products, systems, solutions, and services from the point of power generation all the way to consumption, including HVAC, Fire Safety and Security Controls and field devices, and end customer–oriented apps for economic and ecologic optimization. A robust global service network is also key to customer satisfaction. 

Serving about 250,000 customers and more than 1,000,000 buildings, the Smart Infrastructure service organization comprises more than 7,500 service technicians plus 2,000 subcontractors supported by 2,500 technical support engineers and coordinators across more than 400 branch offices globally. The company’s executive team sought a system upgrade to support its goals: faster service, fewer repeat service visits, and expanded opportunities for field technicians to upsell services—Siemens ambassadors, of sorts. They envisioned a single solution to connect the field technicians, service coordinators, and customers with data.

Driving better service with data

Michael Lützeler, Program Director Field Service at Siemens Smart Infrastructure, sought overall transparency. He aspires to drive operational efficiency through data, giving field service reps advance information about every customer’s situation so that they arrive at every customer call fully briefed and correctly equipped. That’s key to reducing those needlessly repeated visits, known as truck rolls.

On the other side of the equation, Lützeler wants to ensure that customers have clearer insights about the value they get from Smart Infrastructure, including their service contract life cycle and the status of each service ticket.

Smart Infrastructure envisioned a new service delivery model, assigning service jobs among staff and third-party subcontractors dynamically for maximum scalability and flexibility. “We turned to Microsoft Dynamics 365 to align with our pivot to condition- and predictive-based maintenance,” Lützeler explains. “With Dynamics 365 Field Service, data about customers’ installations illustrate how likely technical equipment will break and when. That substantially impacts our customer service delivery organization.” 

Opting for flexible Dynamics 365 functionality

The Smart Infrastructure team evaluated the top vendors carefully. “Selecting a platform like Microsoft Dynamics 365 Field Service is a long term commitment and migrating 12,000 users isn’t something we’d undo in two years,” points out Sébastien Bey, CIO at Siemens Smart Infrastructure. “We wanted a partner that would ensure continuous innovation—a must in an agile and changing world.” Thomas Fischer, Head System House Portfolio Management, agreed. “We work with technicians bringing ideas for improvement almost daily. A software vendor open to working on new features with us was key,” he says.

“Based on our criteria—across business functionality, IT features, and the strategic and investment profiles of each vendor, we chose Microsoft Dynamics 365,” says Gary Tomazevic, Head of IT Strategy, Architecture, and Portfolio at Siemens Smart Infrastructure. “Because it’s a SaaS application, we get immediate benefits from feature releases without rolling out upgrades as we would with on-premises solutions.” 

The team also valued interoperability with Microsoft Power Platform, especially the Microsoft Power BI capabilities connected to Dynamics 365. And with Microsoft Azure Integration Services, Siemens IT gains the advantage of a single vendor for software as a service (SaaS) with Dynamics 365 and Azure.

Siemens engaged with Avanade to implement Dynamics 365. It drew on Microsoft support entities for targeted assistance—FastTrack for Dynamics 365 and Microsoft Consulting Services. They combined Dynamics 365 Field Service with Dynamics 365 Customer Service for a fully connected customer data ecosystem.

Elevating service technicians to ambassadors for Siemens

A trusted relationship with the customer is central to the Siemens service philosophy. “Our customers generally use our individual solutions for at least 15 years,” says Fischer. “Our service people in the field are the ones the customers see most. They may not negotiate contracts and write sales agreements, but they’re the face of the company.”

Lützeler applauds the ease of use. He liked the step-by-step solution that leads the coordinator through the service case life cycle, and the mobile app for field technicians. “We wanted an easy-to-learn, intuitive tool that our users would enjoy,” he says. “Now with the mobile app coming together with the front end, we have a solution that’s much easier for our workers to use and faster to ramp up. This is a clear asset for us that supports our strategic direction.” For office-based teams coordinating field support teams, that usability is essential. Whitney Meissner, Denver Office Fire Safety Field Service Coordinator for Siemens, uses Dynamics 365 Field Service to streamline her workday. She uses it to give the technicians she deploys an edge, too. “It’s very user friendly and so fast,” she says. “Even if I’m covering a zone outside of our Colorado office, I can pull up the building information immediately. Unlike other big companies where service is centralized and impersonal, we know our customers in every region and can build on previous calls to save time for everyone and deliver the best service possible.” 

Drawing on a connected IT ecosystem

David Sebastiao, Solution Architect at Siemens, appreciates the seamless ties between solutions, especially the low-code approach. “Because we import data into Dynamics 365 through Azure, we benefit from interoperability with all the other Microsoft solutions,” he says. “It’s a visual data import and transformation without writing huge, complex functions. We can connect easily with SharePoint for document management and with Power BI for reporting.” 

With field technicians embarking on calls with accurate information, truck rolls are expected to go down by 50 percent and average service calls could be reduced by 45 minutes.  

For Smart Infrastructure, that’s not the most important part. “The service business is a people business,” concludes Lützeler. “That’s why putting our people, our technicians, and our coordinators in the office at the center of the system and empowering them is key to ensuring the best service for our customers.” 

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