Schneider Electric is a 179-year-old company, specializing in the development of technologies to make energy safe, productive, and green. The company also provides project management services to help clients get their processes up and running. Jeffrey Martin is the Quality Systems Specialist and a Facilities Project Manager for the Nationwide Critical Facilities Operations department, managing work and creation of procedures for data center clients, such as major financial institutions, banks and telephone companies.

The data centers managed by Schneider Electric can include multiple buildings per site, with a conservative estimate of 1,400 assets to track and manage for each. With the 18 live data centers managed by Schneider Electric Facilities Operations Team and an estimated total of 25,000 assets, asset management would be nearly impossible without the right system.

Prior to eMaint, the Schneider Electric maintenance department had an inflexible CMMS system, lacking a user-friendly interface and the ability to customize screens. Their new CMMS system would need to be a web-based solution with flexibility to change and customize fields, robust reporting and mobile capabilities with barcode scanning. Because data centers require 100 percent uptime, keeping track of past and upcoming maintenance is vital. After gathering information on ten different systems, the Facilities Operations department chose eMaint as their CMMS solutions provider.

Due to Martin’s past experience with CMMS systems, the intuitiveness of the product, and the company’s partnership with eMaint, the go-live process was very smooth. To streamline processes, Schneider Electric developed an eMaint master account that can be duplicated and updated when new clients come onboard. The company also utilizes eMaint’s private branding option as a value added service for clients.

During implementation, members of the eMaint Services Team performed an on-site visit to “train the trainers” on the system. Martin and his team also developed a training handbook for new employees and to keep seasoned employees up-to-date on training and how-to’s.

With eMaint CMMS, the Schneider Electric team captures downtime, wrench time, tasks, hours spend on equipment, and Preventive Maintenance (PM), Corrective Maintenance (CM) and Predictive Maintenance (PdM) data to generate reports. This provides their data center clients with meaningful information to assist in decision-making, such whether to repair or replace equipment. Schneider Electric also uses eMaint’s maintenance scheduling tools to keep heating and cooling of the centers at safe levels and achieve OSHA compliance.

eMaint offers the personalization that Schneider Electrics’ clients are looking for, as each data center has unique needs and challenges. Schneider Electric also uses eMaint to show clients their value as a data center manager by comparing data about where the client was when they started working with them, to where they are now.

Jeffrey Martin, Quality Systems Specialist & Facilities Project Manager, Schneider Electric