SUMMARY KEYWORDS
Fluke Reliability, Industrial Talk, asset management, maintenance strategy, connected reliability, vibration monitoring, E main condition monitoring, asset criticality, proactive maintenance, training modules, process mapping, user experience, partnerships, R&D investment, accelerate 2025.
00:00
Scott, welcome to the Industrial Talk podcast with Scott. MacKenzie. Scott is a passionate industry professional dedicated to transferring cutting edge industry focused innovations and trends while highlighting the men and women who keep the world moving. So put on your hard hat, grab your work boots and let's go. All right, welcome. Welcome
00:22
to Industrial Talk, the number one industrial related podcast in the universe that celebrates industry professionals all around the world. You are bold, brave, you dirt greatly, you innovate, you collaborate, you solve problems. You are making the world a better place. That's why we celebrate you on Industrial Talk, we are broadcasting on site, accelerate 2025 Austin, Texas, brought to you by those wonderful people at Fluke reliability. Go out to fluke, just type it in. Go to your browser, type in Fluke reliability. You will find them, and you will be amazed. You'll be dazzled. All right, he's been on the hot seat before. He was a little bit different back then. Now he's now, he's completely different today. His name is Jay hack.
01:04
He's the president, right? Vice President, General Manager, Vice President, General
01:09
Manager
01:10
of Fluke reliability, right? Did I get that? Right? Who nailed it? Scott, very good. All right, let's get cracking. Look at him.
01:19
I was looking forward to the conversation. I've
01:21
been looking forward to this as well. Do you remember the first time we met?
01:27
I've done 3000 of these. I'm gonna, I'm gonna lie to you and say, yes, yeah,
01:32
I actually think you may remember the first time we met. This was about four years ago. I had woke up in the morning and I couldn't talk, no way, really. And I came down to do the podcast, and I was here, and we looked, you looked at me, and you're like, Hey, are we doing the podcast? And I, you know, I, I made some, some sign language. We didn't get to do it the first year, so we got, we
01:55
did it last year. We did it last year, which was awesome. Absolutely, before we get going, let's just sort of lay the foundation on who Jay is,
02:05
sure, yeah. So I've been with Fluke for about just shy of eight years. I worked in our calibration division and joined the reliability division about four years ago. Is a membership of the member of the leadership team. I've run part of the business on the commercial side, as well as letter M and A strategy, and just this January, took over as the Vice President opened the entire business. There
02:27
you go.
02:30
You were dazzling on stage.
02:31
Thank you. Thank you, sir. You looked comfortable.
02:35
Were you comfortable?
02:40
I was okay. I was okay. Scott, well, you
02:43
did a good job hiding it. All right, let's talk strategy here briefly. What I see every time I come to the the accelerate event, the user conference. You got mad skills. Lot of people passionate about helping the technology, the tools and and, and for me, let's just say I if I was a manufacturer or somebody in industry, it can be overwhelming and a little threatening, because there you Fluke has a lot of stuff. Where do you see it going well, how do you take all of this, this, we're we're on the reliability lab. So as I you don't know, you can't see, I just reach out. How do you take all of this stuff and just help me understand where to go? How do you get that communication?
03:37
Sure, this is a great question of like, hey, look, I need help. Where do I start? Yes, and so this is, this is a common theme where we're, where our customers reach out to us and look, we want to meet them where they are, help them get started on a journey. And so, really, your anchor point around the whole thing is, is the CMMS and so E main is one of our flagship products. And if you can implement just a basic work order system that is structured and you can track and you have visibility into what you're doing, that's the that's a great first step we talked about on stage as well. Chris summernagle about asset criticality assessments. And so you can do these other things as well. To get started on break the maintenance and being moving from that reactive to that reactive proactive approach as well.
04:30
You know how long this conversation has happened over the 25 years? It's that reactive proactive. It's the heart of the system, the CMMS, or whatever it might be, and being able to track work orders properly, and it goes on and on. It's the same. How do you as an organization begin to truly, and I mean, truly, impact the culture of these companies so that they don't continue to live in that chaotic environment?
04:59
It's a horrible environment to be, and you're absolutely right. So the first thing I think is, you know, I don't there has to be a commitment from the leadership of our customer base and our customers that they want to change, and then we can provide them the technology tools like E maint. We also have a fantastic training department. We do millions of dollars of training a year, and we have different modules for where you are in your journey. Some people are more sophisticated. Some people just need a little bit of coaching. But if you need, if you need a lot of help, we have, we have offerings for that, where we can take, take you in, help you appropriately, templatize email correctly that meets your needs. You were talking about process maps before this, we got giddy about that. You know, we talked about how we how we can do the process mapping. And then there's some elements of of change management that need to occur on site. And again, we can help and support ultimately, that organization has to the customer has to be vested in this. But we, we've done this 5500 times, so we know what, yeah, what good looks like. And we can provide that, that level of support as well. What's
06:18
interesting it because there's a ton of people hanging their shingles out there. I can do this, I can do that. I can what. What gives me comfort and confidence is every time I have a conversation with somebody within fluke, there is, there's this depth of knowledge that that they possess and that gives me greater trust. I might not be in the marketplace for using fluke but I can tell you that that exists.
06:45
So we have 750 professionals in the reliability division alone. And we have, we have very, very good generalists that work with our customers directly, but but rather than just hiring a basic firm that may be a sole provider who's an expert. We got a bench. So if you tell me, I'll give you an example. We have a large pharmaceutical customer that has some very, very unique needs in the life side space for calibration. We have our chief corporate metrologist literally wrote the standard of ISO 17. I'm drawing a blank on the exact regulation, but he literally wrote that standard. He was on the committee, the ISO committee, that you got to love,
07:30
the people who write these standards, you know, they're, they're a different breed. So we're
07:36
like, Okay, let's get a conversation going. We can bring him in and he can, he can actually talk and advise you on, on what to do and how to be successful, and so, so I don't, I think part of what's going and leaning on us, and for most organizations, especially if you're early in your journey, we can, we can really pull, pull and tease this out in our bench strength across The board. Yeah,
08:00
it's, it's so obvious when again I mentioned it, I come here it and everybody's having some really good conversations, and I'm not eavesdropping. I don't want to eavesdrop. But the reality is, you could tell that there, there's this engagement that everybody wants to try to solve. I just, I want to move the needle from this reactive, this chaotic, this this culture, we should, we should be beyond that now, but, but finding you know those trusted, moving that that needle, that to me, is important.
08:36
So would it be okay if I talk a little bit about the modalities and how we do that.
08:43
You had me at modality.
08:46
So look, there are many different types of tools that can help you and modalities. The tool that can investigate these different modalities, what we specialize most in, which is the majority of our offering at Fluke reliability, is vibration. That's probably the largest and most well understood modality. We also it flu, copper thermography and some other tools as well. But vibration is where the bulk of our organization is. So if you look at what's happening today, I think even the majority of this is still route based. I have, yeah, I have a tool. I'm a maintenance deck. You're walking around. I'm doing that, taking readings. We bring the readings back. Maybe we have someone qualified to analyze them. Maybe we don't. It's not a great situation, yeah, what we offer in our offering is we have everything, and are continue to strengthen this offering from A to Z. So we offer route based. So VIV expert two and VIV scanner two are two of our product lines, just where we have great hardware that allows you to do this. We have, we have. A wired solution or an online solution that monitors vibration at the very high end, with bib guard, and then, through our partnership with tree on we offer a wireless sensor, so we kind of cover the gambit of hardware across all of the different vibration modalities to collect information. Okay, the other piece of this is we have E main condition monitoring, and you can see our first this is the first live time we've demoed at this show, the ECM portal. No kidding, and so the ECM portal is a what is a shot, is a one stop shop where it can suck in all the vibration data in an email condition monitoring, you can see what's going on in one place across your facility, and we'll end up rolling out the full version later, but you can see the the public demo over there. And so one of our, one of our things we've done is the customers, just you look at all the different solutions in their market, and you're like, okay, like, I need some wireless sensors. I think, I think we, I think someone, one of my one of my guys on stage. There's 160 different wireless sensor companies, yes, and it's so confusing, it is. And what happens if you still need to do route based and you have two different systems, but, but the advantage of the Fluke system is, look, our stuff is great. It works. It's it's all criminal, the chrome of the market. But now we're getting to the point where we have all of our stuff integrated. It can go in the email condition monitoring portal. You can see everything, and then you actually can easily create alerts and email if something goes wrong. That's, that's that
11:32
connected reliability. That
11:34
is a that is a great example of connected reliability. So connected reliability is just everything plays nice together. Yeah, yeah, exactly a nutshell. But we're really living this in our in our strategy, in our product strategy roadmap
11:49
is in light of connected reliability and, and you mentioned it briefly there. There's a half a million device manufacturers out there tracking whatever data. Is it safe to say that you guys are somewhat agnostic, in a sense that you can pretty much connect to these devices that are collecting data, or is it, is that where you're headed? Or
12:18
we don't connect everything today, to be clear, I wish we did, but, but, but there's a lot of it's it's even more nuanced than that. Just physically connecting device is easy. The problem is how the assets are tagged and built up. Everybody does this a little bit differently. So there's no one that does this perfectly. Our goal is to make it easy and to connect to as many things as possible. So we are maybe the best of a bad bunch is maybe I would, I would characterize it, but we're going in that direction. And what you're going to see this year Scott, which is maybe different, we have double the amount of partners here we had last year. No, no, really. And so with sponsors, and so what you're going to continue to see on is, is where ways, where we have a limitation in our offering, we're going to start partnering more and more with other people to augment our own solution.
13:13
I think it's a good strategy. There's there's some best in breeds out there. There's some really good solutions that exist out there. Yeah, there was this tsunami of there was the point where I have to collect data, and that was in the mindset. So I'm collecting data, and these devices now are coming down in prices, and so I'm going to be able to just sort of stick devices everywhere I could possibly can disregard the cyber side. You know, there's a lot of people who just jump the gun, and I think that they're pulling back a little bit to try to do it a little bit more pragmatically.
13:53
Yeah, it's, I can imagine it would be incredibly frustrated if you implemented something and didn't get the results you desired.
14:02
I That's, that's industry for Dotto,
14:08
so you gotta admit that's so
14:11
it's, it's tough, and it's even tougher in our industry, right? Because how do you quantify the avoidance of downtime you could never see in the first place.
14:24
But, but don't you think that just intellectually? I think it's, there's a reality, there's an acceptance that, if I have an asset that's going down, there's, there is a quantifiable, oh, 100% Oh, there's, like, there's things that you can say 100% Yeah, 100% Absolutely.
14:41
So in all of our assessments, we go into a plant, we can see the 500 assets. We can tell you what it is, we can tell you. We can make some very estimations about what your failure modes look like, how much it will cost you and and we run reports in azema, is part of the azema pack. Package. We do a an annual report with the cost of downtime avoidance, and it's estimations right. It's not at the end of the day, but in almost every case, for the right type of customer, if you've implemented correctly, there's an ROI there,
15:15
yeah. Speaking of Zima, I think last year was relatively new to your portfolio. Where do we stand today? How has that sort of evolved? In a year,
15:27
Azim is doing really good, so I can share with some details publicly. When we go in, we have an investment thesis of what we expect to happen. Azima is running ahead of that, so that's always a good place to be, and it's been a successful acquisition for us. I think we're still in the process of doing a technology integration. So remember I told you that we'll end up migrating the azema platform into E main condition monitoring to get that link, and that will go live later this year, which is super exciting, because then we have, kind of the we have everybody, you know, the proof technique, condition monitoring, products as EMA and email, all now, really tight, coupled network, yeah, so connected today, but strong, better connected tomorrow, yeah, is what I'll say. And we're already at people experimenting, and you can see the demo again over there in the reliability lab.
16:23
I got to do it, but I've been stuck in the salt mine. Haven't been able to go down. So with that, all of this stuff going on, tiger by the tail type stuff, what does your future have hat on? You know you're saying, What are you looking at? What where is it just more the integration, making it more seamless and connect in is that sort of the focus here? Or what do you see? I
16:50
would say we really have three things. One is this. One is increased connection among the portfolios, so that it feels like as much as a seamless experience as we can deliver for the customer. That also makes it easier for the customer to consume and deploy, and it just helps the understanding the second piece this year is, I would say, and this already started last year as an investment in our organic roadmap. We spend, we spend, I would say almost double what a typical part of Fluke spends in R D per dollar of revenue. And that's an Fluke is on par with the industry average. So we invest a lot of R and D. You're going to see new products coming out in the coming months that are really excited. I wish I could share more about them, but, but it's happening. I trust you, but we'll, we'll put out the the teaser now and and these are really exciting. They've been, they've been in the works for a while, and this is something that's really kind of near and dear to my heart, to get a really good modern especially around the user experience on the tool
18:01
is so vital, and it really
18:05
is. It really is something good. And then again, on kind of the third leg, that's the organic Development. We continue to look for partnerships and other companies to bring in the portfolio. We have a fantastic brand. We have fantastic customer relationships. Anything else we can bring in an offer, and again, you see that here in the lab, with with all the new sponsors this year, anything else we can bring in the portfolio and and offer customers that offers them good value, we're all about. So I think half of these, half of these people in this lab I personally recruited to be here. So that feels pretty good. Oh, gee.
18:44
Well, I really, you know, I like the fact that you guys are focused on that user experience. That's one thing, that whole, you know, comprehensive solution, that reliability solution, that that I don't have to work as hard, but then, then, because it's so user friendly, shall we say, I'm able to be in compliant where I'm using the tools, the so that are meant to be used. Because I've been to a number of organizations where I'd see the tool and it's just stuck in a cubicle. Nobody wants to use it like, Come on, man, how does, how does one last question before we wrap it up, how does I mean flukes? Flukes been around forever, anything longer than
19:38
7570 76 years? Yeah,
19:41
been around for a long time, and you're still discovering ways of being able to deliver a solution that I just, it just blows me away, like Did somebody think about that 20 years ago, and they just never execute or what? It's just these solutions that just keep coming out. It's like, wow, that's That's amazing. It, or it's just the technology finally gets up to the point where you can do it. How does fluke? I mean, I just don't get it.
20:07
I mean, we have a very, very strong bench with 1000s of customers this year. You can see which is something new. We also have, we have the rest of Fluke outside of our reliable liability division here for the first time. Oh
20:22
yes, yes,
20:25
so that's true. So we have, you know what we'll call it, most of the most of Fluke products have yellow trade dress, but you'll see we have our acoustic imager, our networks, all these very, very impressive tools that are industry adjacent with the customer base here, but super excited that we have the people who know this and how to develop them. You're awesome.
20:51
Cool conversation. Thank you, Scott, just one second. Don't, don't just wrap it up. How do people get a hold of you? What's the best way you're out on LinkedIn?
21:00
I am out on LinkedIn. J.hack@fluke.com I'd be happy to entertain any emails from your listeners. Steve,
21:09
all right, thank you very much for joining Industrial Talk. Jay hack is the dude. He's the man. Great conversation. You can tell Fluke has got a lot of things going on, and it is a must to be able to connect with them. All right. Well, once again, broadcasting at accelerate 2025 Austin, Texas, brought to you by those wonderful people at Fluke reliability. Check them out. Put it into your URL. You will find them. All right, we're gonna wrap it up on the other side. Stay tuned. We will be right back.
21:37
You're listening to the Industrial Talk Podcast Network
21:47
J hack. How about that conversation? They're doing so many great things at Fluke reliability, that that was accelerate 2025 if you're in the world of asset management, maintenance, reliability, this is an event for you. If you weren't there in 2025 or this year, you need to be there. Next year, you get people like Jay, the strategy, the strategic thinking going on at Fluke reliability is off the charts, all focused on your success, asset management success. There, right there. Jay hack, reach out all the contact information out on Industrial Talk. We're building a platform. Industrial Talk is building a platform that's dedicated to you, industrial professionals. If you have something to talk about, please get in contact with me. If you have a podcast, get in contact with me. Let's make it happen. Captain, all right, people, be brave. Dare greatly hang out with Jay and you'll change the world. We're gonna have another great conversation shortly. So stay tuned. You.