Item: IBM Maximo Application Suite
Rating: 8
Author: Rastko Kadijevic

Overall Satisfaction with IBM Maximo Application Suite

Use Cases and Deployment Scope

It’s mixed. We’re using IBM Maximo Application Suite to manage our IT services. It used to be part of Maximo IT under Control Desk, but since we’re also implementing it now, we use it to bring together all our assets, provide inspection forms, and organize work orders and fieldwork teams. We’re also using the Health module, which is used to calculate the asset health index.

Pros and Cons

Pros

These features are under one application, which is really good, and it’s a big difference from other similar products in the market. It also has these industry extensions where you actually have some pre-knowledge about your industry, so it’s much easier to organize inspection forms for specific types of assets.

Cons

Usually, we have problems with the mobile apps. For about seven out of ten customers, we need to use third-party mobile applications. It’s been a rollercoaster — Anywhere was terrible, then Maximo Mobile for 8 was pretty good, and now with Maximo 9, it’s problematic again. So it’s been ups and downs. But the good thing is that the architecture is open, so we can use third-party applications or even develop our own add-ons. Still, IBM could do this better.

Return on Investment

I mean, it’s usually a good sales point, a good sales pitch, but it’s really hard to calculate it — especially because we’re working in industries where the lifespan of assets is more than 40 years. We usually calculate it around 48 to 72 months or something like that, because the implementations are really big. But yeah, I couldn’t say specifically that we got the money back for our customer in 24 months.

Alternatives Considered

SAP Plant Manager. We’re working a lot in critical infrastructure, so in Europe it’s not allowed by law to put asset data in the cloud, especially when it’s connected to geolocation. SAP is moving to the cloud, and IT is a cloud-only solution. So that’s the advantage of Maximo, and that’s why we’re sticking with it.

Key Insights

Do you think IBM Maximo Application Suite delivers good value for the price?

Yes

Are you happy with IBM Maximo Application Suite's feature set?

Yes

Did IBM Maximo Application Suite live up to sales and marketing promises?

Yes

Did implementation of IBM Maximo Application Suite go as expected?

Yes

Would you buy IBM Maximo Application Suite again?

Yes

Likelihood to Recommend

It’s really good for organizing all your assets and managing your field technician teams. The new features, like the assistant and remote assistant, are also really good. On the other side, for the second part of the question, what’s less appropriate, for example, for network scanning, there used to be a part of the product that handled natural discovery. Now IBM has discontinued that, so we have to use two different products now to scan the IT environment, which is not so efficient, I would say.

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IBM Maximo Application Suite Review