Modernisation of Maintenance – Sales Manager to lead maintenance team

Business growth at NewIcon and the transition to international markets will inevitably mean changes within the company as well. Shipping a large portion of the pharmacy automation systems out into the world, new perspectives are required in maintenance operations and processes.

At NewIcon, maintenance is now part of the sales department, with former Director of Domestic Sales, Jukka Mauranen, running the operations.

Before this, maintenance was part of the production and product development department at NewIcon. The organisational reform was based on the company’s desire to redesign the concept of maintenance services to better meet global customer needs.

“Automation systems are a considerable investment for any hospital or pharmacy, and that’s why our aim is to guarantee their performance throughout their life cycle. Our maintenance experts work close to our customers and they convey to us a lot of valuable customer feedback that enables us to develop our products as well as our operations,” says Marjo Lehtinen, Chief Sales Officer.

Jukka Mauranen, who is now running the maintenance services, has worked at NewIcon for seven years and he has a vast experience in the field of pharmacies and hospitals.

“We have always invested in the maintenance of our automation systems, and our technical support was already working well before the reform. However, we always want to design better services, and Jukka is the right person for the job. He was replaced in domestic sales by Sales Manager Mikko Väätäinen,” says Lehtinen.

Maintenance organisation growing and branching out globally

As the number of pharmacy automation systems sold increases, the maintenance organisation is growing. Recruitment is under way in the maintenance team in Finland, and with NewIcon’s international distributors, the maintenance operations are branching out across the world.

“In the spirit of continuous improvement, we are actively investing in the training of all our maintenance experts. We are making training activities more versatile and regular, and I believe that our customers will benefit from the increasing expertise in faster service and better quality,” Mauranen predicts.

Outside Finland, our distributors’ maintenance organisations are responsible for the maintenance of our systems. The NewIcon maintenance team trains these teams according to the same operating principles as their own, and our maintenance team provides background support.

When we hand over the first automation system to a distributor, we train their maintenance experts at the NewIcon factory in Kuopio. The NewIcon maintenance team will also travel to the target country to install the system and to continue to train the distributor’s maintenance experts.

“The aim is that our distributors will be able to train the end users of the automation systems and take care of maintenance themselves. Of course, the maintenance team in Finland will assist them if necessary. We provide all systems with a secure remote connection that enables us to resolve many problems without travelling to the location,” Mauranen says.