Konica Minolta launches AIRe Link after a successful pilot phase and aims to save one billion kilometres of service travel in the next five years.
In view of the COVID 19 pandemic, Konica Minolta is stepping up remote services in Europe. After a successful pilot phase lasting one year, Konica Minolta is now launching its remote visual support tool AIRe Link and moving from the open beta version to the production version.
AIRe Link allows companies to identify or resolve issues with their printing equipment themselves while being supported remotely by Konica Minolta. In addition, Konica Minolta is offering the solution to external companies for use in other industries.
“The coronavirus pandemic has called the existence of many service and support processes into question. We at Konica Minolta also had to ask ourselves how we could ensure our services were of a consistently high quality while still avoiding travelling to our customers in order not to endanger the health of our customers and employees. As a result of these considerations, we developed our “Remote Services by Default” concept. As the name suggests, we want to offer remote services by default. For our customers, this means above all that they will receive our services much faster and consequently their issues will be solved more quickly. Every time we avoid a trip to the customer’s site, we also save on CO2 emissions”, emphasised André Ziemann, Head of Service & Support at Konica Minolta Business Solutions Europe.
As a cloud solution, AIRe Link enables a technical specialist to see what the customer sees using the camera on the customer’s smartphone or tablet. Instead of installing an application or creating an account, all the customer has to do is click an invitation link sent via text message and a session opens in the browser of their smartphone or tablet. The technical specialist can also use a live pointer or drawing in a snapshot of the customer’s screen to provide visual navigation during problem analysis and to guide the customer through the rectification process.
Konica Minolta has already deployed the solution to service teams in 26 of its 30 National Operating Countries (NOCs) across Europe to reduce on-site visits, ensure higher biosecurity, decrease CO2 emissions, increase customer satisfaction and increase the efficiency of its service and support department.
In addition to AIRe Link being used internally at Konica Minolta in Europe, other industries can make use of it for their devices or machines. More than 1,200 service professionals from external companies created an account in AIRe Link during the open beta phase.
AIRe Link is available in two versions: a free basic version and a professional version for €360 ($425) per user per year. Customers from the open beta phase have reported service travel cost savings of up to €10,000 ($11,816) per year per user thanks to AIRe Link.
For more information, please visit https://www.aire.link/.
