ProcessMap held its customer conference in late May in Hollywood, FL. The event — ProcessMAP Konnect 2019 — reminded us of the famous Forest Gump line, “Life is like a box of chocolates, you never know what you’re gonna get.” This was the first time LNS Research participated in the environment, health, and safety (EHS) software vendor’s annual conference, so we had no preconceptions. ProcessMAP’s ecosystem of customers, partners, and experts gathered to discuss and collaborate on strategy, progress, best practices, solutions, and plans.
The two-day event was indeed like a box of chocolates, packed with a variety of content, solutions, and advice for getting value from ProcessMAP solutions. This post provides coverage of major themes and announcements, and an analysis for ProcessMAP customers and the market.
Strategic Pillars
The conference kicked off with EVP of Customer Success, Todd Jones setting the stage, followed by CEO Dave Rath and Chief Strategy Officer Harold Gubnitsky presenting the big picture of progress and plan. They discussed strategic pillars for ProcessMAP’s continued growth and customer success:
- Customer success 3.0
- User experience (UX) and adoption
- System performance and security
- Data intelligence
- Stakeholder value beyond EHS
- Innovation— today and future
- Partner ecosystem for solution delivery
The company zeroed in on plans to enhance customer support and success initiatives, and rightfully so. Certainly all the strategic pillars are important themes, but we view three as critical success factors for ProcessMAP and its customers: innovation, data intelligence, and partner ecosystem.
Innovations for Today and the Future
The company announced an impressive array of 14 innovations and new capabilities spanning core platform capabilities, analytics, and new functionality. Core platform improvements available within the next quarter include a new UI, extended mobile apps, Application Builder 2.0, 25 “ready-to-use” preconfigured apps, an adoption/usage analytics portal, an artificial intelligence (AI) assistant to complete tasks such as incident reporting, and a new best practices resource library, among several others.
ProcessMAP is also investing in providing integrated, cross-functional views of data needed to optimize risk management and extend value to more stakeholders. This includes “Risk Point,” which brings together a variety of information on connected events to help put large data sets into context for facility risk visualization. Likewise, the “ProcessMAP One” initiative focuses on bringing often-siloed data together into an integrated view, for example, training, competencies, operational performance, maintenance, and inspection data needed to consider all contributing factors in an incident investigation. Enabling an Internet of Things (IoT) framework is a priority for ProcessMAP, including out-of-the-box connectors for operational Big Data, e.g., sensor-generated data from connected worker wearables.
Focus on Data Intelligence
Another major theme throughout the conference was data intelligence, which we view as the lifecycle management of data and converting it to actionable insights to drive performance improvement. The EHS vendor emphasized this topic as a strategic pillar and embedded it throughout the innovation discussions and other customer case study sessions.
Data management has long been a core capability for EHS software platforms. The original emphasis on reporting and descriptive analytics has been superseded by the trend towards more sophisticated predictive analytics that take advantage of Big Data and the transformative technologies of Industry 4.0. ProcessMAP is investing in delivering these capabilities to customers as exemplified by the IoT framework to leverage sensor-generated Big Data. Another example is its “Smart Agents” advanced analytics project, which uses automated rules-based engines to find look for actionable data patterns and insights continuously. Especially noteworthy is the delivery of these capabilities as “data analytics as a service” on a subscription basis, enabling customers to apply ProcessMAP’s data science resources to their issues on demand.
Digital Innovation with Solution Partnerships
We have long held the view that a healthy partner ecosystem is critical to the long-term success of any enterprise software vendor and its customers. After all, customers aren’t looking merely for “products;” instead, they want real-world solutions that deliver value. ProcessMAP emphasized its commitment to partnerships throughout the event, including alliances that leverage innovative digital technologies that integrate with and extend the ProcessMAP platform.
Innovative partner solutions presented included Predictive Safety’s cognitive assessment solution to manage fatigue-related accident risks; the SafeDriver app/system for fleet safety; the SmartCone connected worker multi-hazard IoT solution; and the Opal connected worker location tracking solution. These solutions demonstrated the power of harnessing digital technologies, data, and advanced analytics to reduce risk and improve productivity.
Perhaps the most intriguing and potentially impactful partner announcement was that IBM has teamed up with ProcessMAP in a strategic move to focus on improving workplace safety through IoT-enabled solutions with advanced analytics. The partnership will leverage IBM Watson IoT and the ProcessMAP EHS platform to monitor and analyze exposure to workplace safety and health hazards, enabling real-time identification of and response to hazards, and identification of risk patterns and trends that can be used for preventive intervention based on predictive analytics.
Takeaways and Final Thoughts
If a conference can be like a box of chocolates, ProcessMAP Konnect 2019 delivered a wide variety of interesting offerings, among which we observed many positives. It’s evident that the company has a significant installed base with which it is collaborating to enhance and improve the total ProcessMAP solution offering. The firm is firmly focused on customer success, with an unusually strategic approach that includes explicit alignment with each customer’s business objectives, and executive participation in quarterly business reviews.
ProcessMAP is backing these efforts with R&D investments that are yielding tangible results in the form of improvements to the core platform, new functionality, and leveraging the transformative technologies of Industry 4.0. Everyone knows that companies can (and do) embark on Industrial Transformation with or without the proactive participation of the EHS business function. ProcessMAP provides customers a path forward to take advantage of the opportunity with its emphasis on data intelligence, the IoT framework, and partnerships with technology innovators such as IBM and Predictive Safety, among others.
While driving positive momentum across many initiatives, ProcessMAP should exercise caution to not dilute efforts too much and ensure that each customer initiative captures real-world business value that’s well-documented and articulated. The EHS software competitive landscape is crowded and includes players backed by large, well-resourced global organizations. ProcessMAP’s aggressive moves to embrace digital technologies through development investments and partnerships, coupled with core platform improvements, position it well for continued success, given a sufficiently differentiated go-to-market strategy. We look forward to tracking the vendor’s progress and results over time.
