Lift-Link has great potential for medium-sized companies

Up to now, the platform needed for a real-time digital overview of the lifts and lift components of different manufacturers has been missing. This could now change thanks to the Lift-Link initiative. What is to be made of this solution from the point of view of a consulting and planning office and from the perspective of operators?

By Hendrik Hesse

As a planning office, we are always on the lookout for product-independent and manufacturer-neutral systems, which simplify the management and administration of lifts for us and the lift operators. Since there are various providers with different approaches for the remote lift monitoring, we observe the market very closely to get the best out of it for our operators

In the case of lift companies that automatically include a monitoring system in delivery when selling a lift and state the annual costs additionally in the annual invoice, one should at first be critical. It’s all very well having a system that reports malfunctions and the number of trips but the whole thing has to be affordable. In particular, lifts that are still under guarantee do not in our view need to have such a system permanently integrated with high annual fees.

In our view, if such a system is to make any sense for an operator, it must be able to work irrespective of the particular lift company and of course be affordable. The systems available and operated on the market to date often fail as we see it to meet these requirements.

Do the systems live up to their claims?

Consequently, an operator must first ask the question whether such a system makes sense for its lifts and whether it lives up to the claims made for it. Faster fault reports are good but only half the story. Fast availability of the troubleshooting service is also important as well as the question whether the repairs indicated by the system are really necessary.

Operators also have to be sure that someone takes a regular look at the reports of the remote monitoring system. If we work for the operator, we currently comb through all lift provider portals on a regular basis or wait for e-mails, which are often delivered to us with a time lag, in order if necessary to institute further measures for the operator.

Better data evaluation thank to AI

Many questions still remain open with today’s predictive maintenance systems in lift building. Despite the acquisition of predictive maintenance, rigid maintenance intervals usually still apply, determined according to empirical values or personnel availability.

We expect that the data basis for all remote monitoring systems will greatly improve in the next few years, also thanks to artificial intelligence (AI). Currently, the trick is not collecting data but rather analysing it and drawing conclusions on this basis regarding what the problem with the lift is – AI will also improve this. But as things stand, an independent expert still has to check whether the reported lift fault really requires action.

And what about Lift-Link?

So what about Lift-Link? If the system works as promised, I could imagine that it
• will reduce the number of technician deploy-ments
• facilitate faster reporting of faults
• permit more efficient maintenance planning (predictive maintenance)
• lower the operating and maintenance costs through monitoring and
• detect anomalies.

How might that work? If an impending fault is suspected based on data collection and analysis, Lift-Link should in future be in a position to inform the maintenance company directly via the system. Lift-Link has a certain potential here: this is because many different component manufacturers are involved who know best when their components will probably wear out and can supply Lift-Link with this information in advance. This would make relatively reliable detection possible of when maintenance or repair is impending.

Lift-Link is intended to provide SME operators and lift management providers with a real-time overview, which lift company group systems usually do not offer. As a planning office, we would like to see such a system with real-time overview from a single source.

One cloud for everyone

What also has to be clarified is what happens to the permanently installed remote monitoring systems when the maintenance partner changes. If the new maintenance company can activate the system, this is one less cost. Lift operators are already familiar with this topic from their emergency call technology and would like a system that can also be transferred. Lift-Link creates a bridge here since the system can be independently retrofitted for all lifts or if already available, only has to be activated.

Consequently, Lift-Link is so interesting because all component manufacturers can participate in it and on the other hand, there is only one cloud, which is accessible to all operators, lift companies and lift managers and where they receive all relevant data.

Conclusion

Currently, Lift-Link is above all a kind of trip meter that simplifies needs-appropriate maintenance. Whether it will in future also be able to provide predictive maintenance is not yet clear but if you consider the developments in the AI field, I would expect interesting progress in the years to come.

In my view, Lift-Link has great potential for SMEs. But operators must always be sure that only they determine what happens with their lifts. They must have the last word. 

The author is the owner of the consultancy Aufzugsberatung Hesse in Karlsruhe; the company is one of the supporters of Lift-Link.

What does Lift-Link do? According to the website, Lift-Link is directly connected to the cloud of the lift or lift components and in this way aims to provide lift operators, lift builders, service companies, lift management companies and inspection companies with a compact picture of almost all lifts.

Detailed information and functions from the performance portfolio of the manufacturer cloud can be utilised via links to the respective cloud. Old components or those that cannot be directly linked can be connected via additional sensors.

The project was initiated by the emergency call manufacturers Telegärtner Elektronik (TGE). It is to be launched at the interlift 2025. To date, it is supported by more than 50 companies – including many lift component manufacturers.

We have already presented Lift-Link in our online article “New cross-manufacturer sector platform”.

tge-gruppe.de/liftlink