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ASI's automation technology is OEM agnostic
ASI’s automation technology is OEM agnostic, making it very attractive to mining and farming operations with fleets made up of several different vehicle makes and models.
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By nature, many business-to-business interactions require extensive due diligence before companies commit to a large scale purchase. We typically interact with our customers across a sales cycle of 3-12 months. During this due diligence phase, one of the topics that often comes up is: How does ASI stack up to other vehicle automation solutions in the industry?

Our hope is that the following two articles, The ASI Advantage, Part I & II, will help answer this important question.

We generally see competition from two sources: OEMs and mid-sized robotics companies.

First up are original equipment manufacturers (OEM) that offer their own automation solution. OEMs specialize in manufacturing and economies of scale.
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Once a new product or feature is proven and engineered for assembly on the production floor, OEMs add it to their product offering. The drawback is that this process takes so long that OEMs may be limited on the automation solutions they provide.

For example, we recently had a discussion with an OEM that has a competing automation solution for one vehicle model, but they wanted to explore using our products to supply automation solutions for their other vehicle lines.

For example, we recently had a discussion with an OEM that has a competing automation solution for one vehicle model, but they wanted to explore using our products to supply automation solutions for their other vehicle lines.
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Technologies engineered for production may also be inflexible. Due to this, OEMs are generally not the best option for end users looking for a highly customized solution. End users, and even OEMs, on the hunt for custom solutions should look to smaller, more versatile companies—like ASI—that are set up to manage custom requests.
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Another challenge that end users face with OEMs is fleet exclusivity. Because of the sheer amount of capital it takes to produce large equipment, OEMs are generally large organizations, few in number, and often seek to guarantee business by signing end users into exclusive fleet contracts.

Fleet agreements may grant access to technologies like vehicle autonomy, but also may expose end users to higher maintenance fees, forced upgrades, and other embedded costs.
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We spoke to one representative from a major mining company who said they would rather partner with a smaller company like ASI for automation solutions than to rely on OEMs. By choosing third party technology providers, their company would have the flexibility to choose whatever vehicle make they want and keep their OEMs contracts in check.
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In short, ASI stacks up very well with OEMs that offer similar automation solutions. We find that end users are often looking for custom solutions for specific problems and greater contractual flexibility. Our universal automation capabilities are attractive to end users that run multiple vehicle makes and models at their operation and to OEMs that want to offer a full range of autonomous vehicles to their customers.

Whatever their purpose in coming to us, we feel confident in our ability to provide a simple and safe automation solutions to all our customers.
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