Service design becomes integral part of Etteplan’s offering

Etteplan specializes in industrial engineering services and embedded systems, the industrial internet (IoT) and technical documentation solutions. Service design expertise at Etteplan centers on its brand Soikea, which it acquired last year. Soikea, established in Jyväskylä, has expanded its operations and opened up a new office in Vallila, Helsinki.

“We wish to be close to our customers and serve our customer base in the capital region better than ever. Our service offering is now an excellent blend of Etteplan’s technology expertise and Soikea’s user-driven knowhow. The merger of service design and engineering expertise makes it possible to carry out better solutions and contributes to our customers’ success,” says Kari Liuska, Etteplan’s Senior Vice President, Embedded Systems and Industrial Internet.

Investing in service design and user experience design guarantees Etteplan a strong competitive edge on the markets. Service design enriches traditional engineering by shifting the focus of design more onto the end user. Service design helps to concentrate on what is essential and to build solutions that are technically viable, easy to use and suit the customer’s business.

“For instance, in user interface design carried out for industrial equipment suppliers, it is important to ensure that the solutions function efficiently in all conditions both from the perspective of the operating employee and the customer’s business. So you have to be able to use them with work gloves, in the dark, in bright sunlight or damp and dusty conditions, for example,” says Soikea’s Vice President Anssi Kuoppala.

Service design boosts business benefits of digitalization

In addition to user interface design, service design is integrated into Etteplan’s industrial digital services and into capturing the possibilities offered by the IoT in a business-driven manner.

“Industry is becoming digitalized at a tremendous rate. Digital solutions and the IoT have enormous potential in maintenance, for example, as equipment automatically transfers data on the need for maintenance and remote control possibilities grow. If we can improve how we glue together customers’ previously separate processes, we can assemble digital maintenance solutions or technical documentation into better service packages or create entirely new services and business models,” says Kuoppala.

He points out that the benefit of service design lies in its approach. A traditional technical perspective steers engineers to consider what and how measurements can be performed, but in terms of business, it is far more important to ask why and what the achievable benefits are.