Data Sheet
PTC Service Center
Inter active, Contextual Technical and Parts Information Delivery
Product success hinges on the ability to deliver
consistent, high-value customer experiences
throughout a product’s service lifecycle. Your
service network must move quickly and effectively to excel and stay ahead of the competition.
Growing service and product complexity and increasing
customer demands for high-quality service experiences are
driving product companies to reevaluate their overall service
experience. It is vital to establish an exceptional service
experience for product owners, service technicians, warranty
managers and other stakeholders. Unfortunately, today’s
service organizations find themselves struggling under the
weight of customized, aging information architecture or
contending with silos of disparate service process tools that
support a variety of disconnected information sources.
As the pressure to increase profits, revenues and customer
satisfaction grows, service organizations are compelled to
rethink how they support their entire service network with upto-date, product-specific technical and parts information. This
vital information needs to be easily accessible online and
offline, easily understood, applicable to the user and, most
importantly, accurate.
Raise Dealer and Customer Satisfaction
Increase Service Worker Utilization
Improve Service and Parts Accuracy
Reduce Resolution Cycles
Lower Costs of Service and Warranty
PTC Service Center provides the industry’s first productcentric, Web-based service information delivery system.
service parts products, PTC solutions deliver unparalleled
value to global product support and service organizations.
This system significantly improves the access, usability
and accuracy of technical and service parts information.
This innovative software platform provides the ability
to dynamically deliver service information across a
comprehensive range of formats, including configurationspecific operator manuals, service procedures, maintenance guidelines, training on demand and interactive
parts lists. Combined with PTC’s technical information and
Product-centric Service Information Delivery
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With PTC Service Center, PTC set out to deliver the industry’s
first product-centric service information delivery platform. This
unique software provides companies with a flexible, Webbased information repository that leverages product-centric
technical and parts information managed by Windchill®
Service Information Manager and Windchill Service Parts .
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Data Sheet
This combination of capabilities provides an unparalleled
solution to create, manage and deliver technical and service parts information that's synchronized with real-time
product configurations.
Product-centric Information Structures
Product-centric content reflects the actual product structures
that originate in product development, which then enables
companies to derive service information structures. These
information structures provide service engineers with the
ability to define service and parts content requirements to
operate, service and maintain equipment in the context of the
product configuration. Additionally, due to associativity with
product development data, the related service and parts information remains up-to-date with current engineering designs.
Windchill Service Information Manager and Windchill Service
Parts leverage product and engineering data from Product
Lifecycle Management (PLM), including mechanical CAD
(MCAD) solutions, and enable service planners to define
their own service information structures. It’s this productcentric approach, with an as-supported view of a finished
product, which unlocks the power of the PTC Service Center.
It allows users to navigate by the product – both graphically
and contextually – in perspective of the product itself, based
on specific models, configurations or regional considerations.
Throughout the service planning stage, technical authors and
illustrators provide specific, component-level content that
supports the comprehensive information requirements of the
products. Since this information is topic-based and graphical
in nature (e.g., 2D and 3D illustrations), these components
are associated and reused with specific product components
across product lines. Please see related PTC authoring
and illustration product information for Arbortext® and
Creo® Illustrate.
PTC Service Center user interface, featuring intuitive navigation of productcentric service information.
Many companies have tried to provide information faster
by converting paper documents to digital documents
hosted on Web applications. However, much of this digital
content remains static in the forms of PDFs, Microsoft Word
documents and HTML pages. Making existing information
digital may solve the accessibility problem, but it does not
address accuracy and usability issues. In fact, it just makes
poor information available faster.
Best-in-class companies have begun transforming the ways
they structure, manage and deliver their service information.
This transformation ensures that their service network has the
most up-to-date technical and parts information at the right
time, in the right place.
Features
Java-based, Web-based Information Delivery Platform
Faster Access Doesn’t Fix Bad Data
Today most support functions are forced to spend valuable
time trying to locate and understand product content in order
to service equipment. Once found, this information is often
inconsistent with current product design or service procedures
and not specific to the user, product or task — resulting
in higher service and parts errors, slow resolution times,
increased cost of service and increased equipment downtime.
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The system provides hosted (online), disconnected (offline)
and mobile access to direct service workers and dealer
networks, as well as individual owners/operators. Incremental
updates are distributed via the Web and can be redistributed
by dealers to their service network.
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Data Sheet
The system consists of these major components:
User Interface
• Content Repository
• Flexible and configurable to support custom branding and
specific user experiences
• Relational Database
• Web Services in OSGi Framework
• Search Index
Dynamic Search
Full system search and results can be filtered by product
configuration, content type and other metadata
Dynamic Filtering
Filtering system based on different types of information
• Product options that are carried over from Windchill
Service Information Manager enable applicability
level filtering
• Information categories or facets that are based on
information type, such as specifications, instructions, tests
and user roles
Security
Log-in and data encryption for both online and offline;
Authentication with LDAP/SSO
Scalability
Enterprise platform that can support more than 30,000
concurrent users, averaging 90-minute sessions, across the
globe with 24-hour access
• User interface can be extended
Service Information Repository
• PTC Service Center was designed for the delivery of
product-centric content developed and managed by
Windchill Service Information Manager and Windchill
Service Parts. The system can also handle legacy content
as well as other enterprise source data
• PTC Service Center for Technical Information – provides
the information components to support the interactive
delivery of service procedures, operator guides, maintenance guidelines and product training materials, as well
as several other types of technical information required for
the operation, maintenance and service of products
• PTC Service Center for Service Parts – makes the spare
parts information available for every product configuration and enables the automated delivery of interactive,
illustrated parts lists throughout the service lifecycle
• Legacy Content – enables third-party content such as rich
text, PDFs, Microsoft Word documents and fiche
• Non-technical Document Files – such as Flash, firmware
and software, can also be made available in PTC Service
Center and leveraged on-site during service events
Content Access Options
• PTC Service Center Expert Users – are dedicated named
users across the service ecosystem; requires log-in access
to filter content and assign permissions in the system.
These users usually consist of both internal and external
users from field service, training, support staff and related
service ecosystem disciplines
• PTC Service Center Web Access – provides Web-based
access to general, nonexclusive technical and parts
information typically made available to non-essential
service workers, such as end-user consumers
PTC Service Center delivery of an interactive parts list.
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Data Sheet
• Data Access Services – PTC Service Center is designed
to function as a single enterprise service repository and
allow data exchange with enterprise systems such as
contact center systems, enterprise resource planning,
customer portals, dealer systems and manufacturing and
repair sites
Navigation
• Graphical – supports both 2D and 3D views to navigate
visually through product structure; full 3D interaction
supported to include zoom in, zoom out, spin and explode
service procedures and parts
To learn more visit: PTC.com
© 2012, Parametric Technology Corporation (PTC). All rights reserved. Information described
herein is furnished for informational use only, is subject to change without notice, and should
not be construed as a guarantee, commitment, condition or offer by PTC. PTC, the PTC logo,
Creo, and all PTC product names and logos are trademarks or registered trademarks of
PTC and/or its subsidiaries in the United States and in other countries. All other product or
company names are property of their respective owners. The timing of any product release,
including any features or functionality, is subject to change at PTC’s discretion.
J0186_Service_Center_DS_EN_0512
• Information Structures – leveraging product structure from
engineering data to navigate through hierarchical view of
information structures
• Model or Serial Number – system can support configuration-specific navigation if information is available
• Tree View – provides a traditional information tree view
• Breadcrumbs – users can navigate back using typical
breadcrumb links
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