FLIQ was born when our founding member Lassi’s maintenance company had a need for CMMC software but all the available options on the market felt clumsy and old-fashioned when it came to usability. That’s when the thought first hit: the CMMS aka computerized maintenance management system had to be reinvented.
The year was 2014. The level of maturity in maintenance was, and still is, fairly low in many companies: mainly working in a reactive manner putting out fires. There was a need for a system that could help raise maturity from a reactive to a proactive and predicting model. The leading thought was making usability better in order to take data entry, collection and its validity to a higher level. As no such software was available on the market, we decided to create it ourselves.
The basis for creating our own software was excellent, as we had strong knowhow in programming in our immediate family: Lassi’s brother and founding member Anssi was an experienced system architect. At the time, he was living and working in Australia with information systems related to trading. Anssi was just finishing up a big project and was excited when Lassi contacted him and asked him to be part of the new project. Things escalated quickly. One month later Anssi traveled with his family to spend Christmas in Finland – traveling with him was the first test version of the new mobile application.
During the holidays, the two brothers spent time discussing core questions: how could they make usability better and what would be that special something that would make them stand out? Up came an idea of a graphic interface that would visualize the users’ own environment – that was it! The base would be a layout of the factory and items would be dragged on top of this base. This way all functionalities could be easily collected into the same view. A fun detail is that both brothers, without knowing each other’s thoughts, came up with the exact same thought about a graphic interface at the same time. When Lassi wanted to share his idea with his brother, Anssi had already coded a draft of the interface the previous day.
And so, it started. Anssi returned to Australia to code the software’s first version, but due to the long distance, a local partner was also needed. Anssi had a wide network of friends that included founders of Devatus Oy, a software development company that had developed information systems for industrial use for a long time. We shared our idea with them and one month later Fliq Oy was founded – its owners being Lassi’s maintenance company, Tähtipiste Oy, Anssi and Devatus Oy.
The knowhow of Tähtipiste from industrial processes and automation systems combined with Anssi’s and Devatus’ knowhow on industrial information systems and processes formed us into an almost perfect combination. When the first software version was released, feedback from pilot customers was very good. It was our own feeling as well that we had created a completely different product that was ahead in usability compared to competitors.
The innovation and development work done together with our customers has led to our product developing from a CMMS software into a Smart Factory platform based on micro service architecture. It brings together multiple applications to manage everyday operations and increase productivity. Defining factors are for example utilizing location information and machine learning in managing resources. Our software has been developed in its own field with leading global companies – they trust us and our knowhow. From the beginning, the core of our development has been providing added value to our customers: faster, easier, and always utilizing the newest technologies.
For these brothers, the passion for solving problems and belief in the power of working together is based on their background in team sports: you win as a team, and you lose as a team. Succeeding and winning is great and rewarding, but what matters most is that you learn from defeats and mistakes. The key to continuously developing yourself and your team is in fact in allowing mistakes. Try, fail, practice, and try again. If you still don’t succeed, try another angle. Ask and listen to your “teammates” and customers as they are also part of the team.
A winning culture is built on co-operation and allowing mistakes as well as hard work and high standards. Everyone should feel part of the team, and every individual should be respected and treated equally. In this way, everyone will do their best share in making the team succeed.
You are allowed to and should have fun on your road to success as work is part of everyday life and should thus be enjoyable. When you feel good at work, it reflects to your free time and vice versa. Our goal is to build a successful and enjoyable workplace for everyone – a workplace where Mondays feel like Fridays! Utopia? If we can get even close to that, we are sure to succeed.
In the year 2021 our team is 20 people strong. However, our story is just beginning. We believe that the start of a successful future is built on these foundations. Join our journey!
FLIQ – Simplifying factory operations
