Author | Henk Wynjeterp – Regional Lead – Europe | Henk leads Pragma’s OEM after-sales practice for food processing and packaging manufacturers.
If you sell into OEM after-sales, you’ve seen the eye-roll. “Servitization” has become a vague, catch-all promise that rarely addresses the day-to-day reality of running a profitable service operation across regions, agents and dealers. What leaders actually buy is execution: the ability scope and cost every agreement accurately and to deliver every agreement reliably, at scale, with precise commercial control.
From our work with OEMs in food processing and packaging, three things separate execution from aspiration:
Readiness beats rhetoric.
You’ve committed to service revenue growth; the next step is to confirm execution readiness. Our AMIP (Asset Management Improvement Programme) is a structured assessment of data, processes and accountabilities. It quickly exposes where an after-sales operation will struggle at scale, for example, incomplete installed-base registers, insufficient maintenance tasks and job plans, conflicting engineering item codes/BOMs, or gaps between ERP, CRM and EAM. We benchmark maturity (installed base, work and SLAs, spares/BOMs, costs and quoting) and turn the findings into a practical, time-phased roadmap, so teams know what to fix first. The goal isn’t a glossy strategy deck – it’s a clear sequence of steps into reliable service execution.
Build the digital backbone.
Processes won’t scale without a single source of truth. Key EAM software brings together the installed base, work execution and SLAs, spare parts, and as-maintained BOMs, as well as commercial data, all connected to ERP and CRM, resulting in faster quoting and consistent delivery. In our Meyn programme, the team was able to scope a five-year service agreement in under eight hours, maintain >90% contract retention, and deliver 100% profitable service contracts, all while growing after-sales revenue >10% annually with ERP (Baan) and Salesforce seamlessly integrated into the workflow1.
Scale capacity without adding headcount.
Execution can fluctuate when teams are stretched too thin to maintain the installed base and as-maintained BOMs, develop and update maintenance plans, and manage the work order process, including generating work, updating for customer-specific scenarios, and reviewing feedback for follow-up work. That’s why many OEMs add EAMaaS (Enterprise Asset Management as a Service) to supplement their capacity in the digital back-office. The service keeps data accurate and the execution cadence disciplined, so your technicians, agents and dealers can stay focused on delivery. The impact is significant.
Turn intent into outcomes.
The takeaway? Drop the buzzword and meet leaders where they are. Start with a readiness check to de-risk the operating model. Implement a digital backbone that serves as the single source of truth across commercial and execution processes. Then add capacity support to keep the engine running day in, day out. That’s the language and the operating reality that converts decisions into outcomes.
Market tailwinds reinforce this focus: recent BCG research finds that aftermarket services now grow faster than new equipment and contribute around one-third or more of income for many industrial manufacturers (~10% revenue growth in 2023 and ~8% expected in 2024).2
Ready to take the first step towards operational improvement? We offer an executive-level AMIP assessment that can be quickly turned into a focused, time-phased action plan. And if you want to see the backbone in action, book a short On Key demo, where we’ll show how a single source of truth accelerates quoting and ensures consistent delivery. Interested? Let’s get started.
References
- Case Study | Meyn Food Processing Technology
- https://www.bcg.com/publications/2025/aftermarket-services-drive-growth-for-industrial-manufacturers
