Transforming Global Service Delivery with Real-Time Instrument Data

About Hach

Hach manufactures and distributes analytical instruments and reagents used to test the quality of water and other liquid solutions. Their systems, ranging from on-line instrumentation to portable lab tools, simplify water analysis for municipalities, industries, and research facilities worldwide.

The Challenge

With more than half a million water testing instruments deployed globally, Hach faced growing complexity in servicing their customers efficiently. Their existing IoT solution fell short in several areas:

• Limited visibility into installed instruments and serial numbers, slowed down service.
• Service teams relied on incomplete or inaccurate customer-reported data before taking action.
• High costs from dispatching technicians for onsite service calls.
• Inability to act on instrument fault codes quickly without logging into separate systems.

Hach’s objective was clear: make instrument data accessible and actionable directly within Salesforce and ServiceMax, where service teams already work, to automate responses, reduce truck rolls, and enable predictive maintenance.

The Solution

After a successful two-month pilot program, Hach confirmed the value of having water testing instrument data available in real time. In under three months, their instrument monitoring solution went from concept to production across North America and Europe, connecting an initial 5,000+ instruments.

Bolt Data Connect was implemented to:

• Process and analyze large volumes of instrument data for actionable insights.
• Track performance in real time across thousands of instruments.
• Automate service actions using fault code detection and AI-driven orchestration.
• Enable remote diagnostics to reduce costly onsite visits.
• Predict maintenance needs before failures occur.

The Results

With Bolt Data Connect, technicians and support teams can visualize and manage all connected instruments through an IoT Console:

• Map & table views showing instrument type, location, and status (offline, alert, normal).
• Thing Charts to livestream sensor readings over time.
• Digital Twin representations for each instrument, displaying sensor-level data and status.

When a case or work order is created, the instrument’s real-time data, contract details, manuals, and knowledge base articles are automatically attached, ensuring teams have everything they need to resolve issues quickly.

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