Interview with Markus Asch, Alfred Karcher GmbH & Co. KG

In our understanding, we are probably at the starting point of a fundamental change in our industry. And some of it is driven by achievement or at least now understanding is driven by changes in habits of our customers and changes in expectations of our customers. And maybe let me give you a couple of examples. If you look for example at office, offices are essentially changing from fixed office where everybody has his or her personal office to a much more open office space. And then it becomes very natural: if you have an open office and today you are there, tomorrow you are there, you wonder happily to have the information which offices are busy, which desk is being used, which desk is not being used. Therefore adopting using procedures to it. We will not accept in the future that static cleaning procedures that have been tendered for, that have been executed over many months or weeks or years, will be good enough for the future. Why? Because reality and demand is changing all the time. Cleaning is now at the point where it has to adapt to the requirements of the customers. That means we call it connectedly or cleaning on demand. All the various factors that are happening they need to be very carefully connected in order to adapt to a much more flexible cleaning. But as we all can imagine, this is not about a product; this is about a whole integrated system.

But we have done a couple of years ago. We have introduced fleet for our machines, and believe it or not, the reality what we see by introducing fleet to more than ten thousand machines in the market is fantastic or frightening. Because we usually talk to our building service contractors: 'What is your expectation how much time will that machine be deployed today?' If any incidents where the machine has to be in one state and in reality it was exactly in the opposite state. In the same country, the building service contractor even you know it second, then you need to manage below because you need to know where your people are and how can you efficiently manage them. Maybe they have an issue there, they take much too long in that room while held because because because and you know, and you need to monitor and you need to help them improve. That's why we introduced the component manager. But then you need to help the people to become more efficient in what they do. That's why we're investing millions per year into battery technology, because battery technology will help them be more efficient in the future. And then there's a third or fourth component and that's connecting all of that. The future is not an isolated system but collaborative work. That's why already since last year we already talked about collaborative robotics. So basically the robot has to tell what they can do and what they could not do, what the person has to do. 'Look, I will take care of that room, you take care of the corridor.' And then the next question is who is going to manage that. And that's what we call connectedly.

So all in all, we have been awarded the Innovation Award for the new Kyra, the all-new robotic, not because maybe it does a better navigation system but because it's a much more thought-through process, the stocking station fully autonomous but also integrated into a bigger picture. Digitalization at the same time is not only looking at the cleaning but also in the way how they interact with each other and requirements from customers. They want to have an ease of doing business with us, and that's going to be in the future divided into two main areas. So one is we need to have a lot of competence and share our competence when it comes to setting up facilities: what is the right solutions, what machines, what detergents, what applications, how to combine them, where do we need people, how many people do they need, where could they use a machine over, is it better to do it manually? That's where you need high competence. So they need to people in supporting and working very closely together as the building service contractors, all this with customers in order to set up a facility. And then the remaining part, the repeatable replenishment of machines, replenishment of detergents, of consumables, of filter bags, maybe a replacement of machine, that should be done as easy as possible. And that all will move into a digital array so that people will not be involved in doing repetitive tasks, doing replenishment tasks. So that will be more and more automatic. Here we already are testing some of that, but we are only at the beginning. There we will see substantial changes. So it's not that the interaction with our customers will in the future be all online, but repetitive tasks in the understanding will be online. When it comes to consulting, to solution providing, that's where people are required. Honestly, what Hanover's inclement weather facility management and cleaning will be a good combination? Because very often facility management are the ones who hold the facility, they order facility management but they are not the ones who operate the facility. So maybe workplace management, office, meeting rooms, and introducing quality into the workplace, making them happy, that's closer to cleaning than actual facility management. So in my understanding, facility services will more and more merge together, not necessarily facility management and cleaning, but that's at least one possible view of looking at it.