Oceaneering modernizes legacy apps, reducing downtime and costs

Challenge

Diving into the depths of legacy systems

As a worldwide leader in subsea robotic services, Oceaneering is known for its vast and innovative portfolio of technology and solutions. However, even the most modern organizations have to deal with legacy systems.

With an outdated inventory management tool for offshore that was difficult to navigate, many of the technicians were reverting back to printed paper and manual counts, which was tedious and prone to error. Given the specialized requirements for inventory management in a harsh environment, Oceaneering set off to find a solution to streamline its offshore field operations, improve the user experience, and ultimately modernize all of its legacy systems.

The company quickly realized two things: 1) off-the-shelf solutions weren’t an option due to the uniqueness of its business; 2) given the breadth of its modernization needs, speed was vital—which led Oceaneering to low-code.

After evaluating the leading low-code platforms, Oceaneering chose OutSystems.

Solution

When user experience transforms into user adoption

The first order of business was to replace an old inventory management system used by technicians who travel offshore on rotations to manage Oceaneering’s underwater remotely operated vehicles (ROVs).

Having an accurate inventory is crucial to reduce downtime during both planned and unplanned maintenance, and when it manages $60+ million worth of inventory of parts across all offshore projects, the slightest mistake can cost a lot of money.

The old solution was a cumbersome scanner/handheld-based app with a terrible user experience and several synchronization issues. “Users had to navigate eight screens while wearing offshore gear that included gloves, helmets, and glasses, making every click a painful task,” Hari explained. “The experience was so bad that our technicians stopped using the application and went back to manually uploading the data into an Excel sheet or using paper.”

With OutSystems, Oceaneering built a tablet application that gives offshore crew a portable and efficient tool for on-the-fly inventory management. The new app integrates with the device’s camera and works offline—a key feature as most offshore work is performed in challenging conditions with minimum to no internet connection.

Now, users can update inventory in real time, whether they're consuming parts, getting orders, or doing cycle counts—all on a single screen.

“Tracking inventory was just a small part of these offshore missions, but it consumed much of our technicians’ time due to unresponsive technology. OMS-Invent came to change that,” Hari said. “The simplicity of the interface and the speed with which they can register inventory and send reports onshore has speeded up this task, leaving more time for workers to perform all the other activities they have to do.”

Results

Fewer errors, improved efficiency, happier employees

OMS-Invent had an immediate impact. Cycle counts, crucial for verifying stock levels, increased 71% in the first 12 months since the app was launched. Global inventory accuracy improved drastically too. The overdue in-transit orders over 180 days that were not received were reduced by 90%.

These aren’t just numbers; they translate into fewer errors, reduced downtime, and lower cost of poor quality (COPQ).

But the app’s impact extends far beyond measure metrics. It empowered the crew across 250+ offshore locations worldwide to streamline operations, and it has increased trust in the inventory and heightened interest in actively managing it.

Since the launch of OMS-Invent, Oceaneering has modernized more than 19 solutions, including a tailored employee onboarding solution—Horizon—that is now being rolled out to Oceaneering offices worldwide.