Leentje Chavatte
Microsoft, Data & AI and Digital Transformation
Modern coffee is complicated. Gone are the days when a quick cup of ‘instant’ in the morning would satisfy most of us. Coffee is a living, breathing culture, and with it comes a burgeoning set of consumer expectations. Meeting and exceeding them determines whether coffee businesses sink or swim in an industry where you’re only as good as your last latte.
It’s amazing to think that when Swiss coffee machine provider, Thermoplan, was founded in 1974, there was only a single Starbucks store worldwide. 45 years later, the American coffee giant operates more than 28,000 locations globally. That’s a lot of coffee machines. And it’s Thermoplan that supplies most of them.
What makes Thermoplan’s machines the coffee-makers of choice for businesses in 72 different countries, including clients like Starbucks and Nespresso?
They’re connected to the cloud.
Rolf Hochstrasser, Project Manager at Thermoplan, explains:
“Previously we did not have our coffee machines connected to the cloud and could not receive data that would help us track any possible issues with the machines. We relied heavily on time-based maintenance to keep them running. The move to an IoT-based solution was driven by a request from one of our key accounts, expressing the need for a cloud connected machine that can give valuable insights”.
Using Microsoft Azure as a cloud platform, Thermoplan developed a solution that enabled them to remotely monitor and gain deeper insights on the statistics for every coffee machine used by its customers. Insights like the amount of coffee being consumed, or customers’ favourite drinks, or when machines parts needed changing.
The impact for Thermoplan’s clients was immediate. Now they can enjoy benefits such as proactive stock control, reduced product wastage and better maintenance of machines via predictive analytics. By being able to record all of their machines’ activities, Starbucks, Nespresso and all of Thermoplan’s other clients can rest assured they are consistently serving coffee that meets their customers’ increasingly high standards.
Thermoplan’s migration to the cloud came with help of company’s long-term Microsoft partner, bbv Software Services.
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