This paper focuses on a study of total productive maintenance (TPM) in three companies. The companies implemented TPM because of the business difficulties they faced. In all three companies senior management had supported TPM and set up suitable organisational structures to facilitate its implementation. The companies had followed Nakajima’s seven steps of autonomous maintenance, although different TPM pillars had been adopted, with the common ones being improvements, education and training, safety, and quality maintenance. The main differences in TPM implementation related to the use of ABC machine classification system and the role of facilitators.