LineWise

What do they actually do

LineWise builds an AI assistant for factory floors that turns frontline videos and documents into clear, step‑by‑step SOPs and troubleshooting guides. It also offers conversational search over manuals/SOPs, proposes likely root causes when a line or machine fails, and delivers visual, technician‑ready fix steps on tablets or headsets. Each resolved incident is saved back into a searchable knowledge base for future use (LineWise site, YC profile).

Today the product is in pilots and early paid deployments with enterprise manufacturers, with initial traction in packaging, food & beverage, and consumer electronics. The team sells through demos/POCs and industry events, then works to expand pilots into rollouts inside plants (press, LineWise site, LinkedIn).

Who are their target customer(s)

• Plant / operations managers at mid‑to‑large factories: They need to minimize downtime and stabilize output; stoppages are expensive and unpredictable, and fixes often depend on scarce experts (LineWise site, press).
• Maintenance leads / reliability engineers: They must diagnose diverse machine issues quickly but lack organized records of past fixes, so troubleshooting is slow and knowledge leaves with staff turnover (YC profile, LineWise site).
• Frontline technicians and line operators: They need simple, visual, step‑by‑step instructions during a shift, not long manuals or waiting on phone support (LineWise site).
• Quality / continuous‑improvement managers: Recurring defects and rework reduce yield; they need consistent, auditable SOPs and fixes so problems don’t repeat across shifts or lines (press, LineWise site).
• Training / workforce development leads (HR / ops training): Onboarding new or temporary workers is slow and inconsistent due to reliance on shadowing and tribal knowledge (YC profile, LineWise site).

How would they acquire their first 10, 50, and 100 customers

• First 10: Convert current paid pilots into referenceable deployments by embedding a deployment engineer, scoping pilots to prove a specific metric (e.g., time‑to‑fix), and securing written case studies and references at close (LineWise site, press).
• First 50: Productize the pilot with a standardized demo → POC → one‑line rollout kit and pair a small AE/BDR team with partners (system integrators, OEM service, CMMS vendors) targeting similar plants in packaging, F&B, and electronics (LineWise site, LinkedIn).
• First 100: Launch a partner/reseller program and lighter self‑serve onboarding for smaller plants while adding field success engineers for enterprise accounts; invest in features that cut deployment effort (PLC/sensor ingestion, tablet/headset workflows, audit exports) (YC profile, press).

What is the rough total addressable market

Top-down context:

Analyst categories that map to LineWise—MOM/MES, industrial asset/maintenance software, and AI in industrial automation—sum to a defensible TAM in the ~$20B–$45B range globally when accounting for overlap (Grand View Research – MOM, Verdantix – industrial asset mgmt, Grand View – AI in industrial).

Bottom-up calculation:

If target plants budget ~$20k–$100k/year for troubleshooting/visual SOP software, then 10,000 plants × $50k ARPA ≈ $500M/year; 50,000 plants × $25k ≈ $1.25B/year—consistent with CMMS/EAM pricing ranges (LLumin pricing guide, Facilio pricing discussion).

Assumptions:

• MOM/CMMS/industrial AI markets overlap; avoid double counting when summing.
• Per‑plant willingness to pay varies by plant size, margins, and compliance needs.
• Realization depends on demonstrating measurable downtime reduction to justify higher ARPA.

Who are some of their notable competitors

• Parsable: Connected‑worker platform for digital SOPs and execution data; competes on digitizing procedures and analytics, but does not focus on automatic video→SOP conversion and probabilistic root‑cause triage (product, customers).
• Poka: Factory knowledge/training tool for visual work instructions and troubleshooting knowledge bases; overlaps on visual SOPs but is positioned as an all‑in‑one connected‑worker suite rather than a video‑driven root‑cause engine (digital work instructions, platform).
• Augmentir: AI‑first connected‑worker platform with generative assistants, AR, and skills management; competes on AI guidance across training and work instructions, broader than LineWise’s video‑ingestion focus (product, news).
• Tulip: No‑code shop‑floor app/MES‑adjacent platform for visual work instructions and machine‑connected workflows; strong on composable apps and integrations, less on automatic extraction of SOPs from freeform videos or probabilistic root‑cause ranking (digital work instructions, platform).
• PTC Vuforia Chalk: AR remote‑assist for expert–technician video calls and annotations; overlaps on visual guidance but is a live collaboration tool, not an AI that converts incidents into SOPs or ranks root causes (product, PTC notice).