Current commercial terms. These terms apply to all MTIS services and to the MTIS Failure Investigator application. Where a quotation, order or signed agreement states different terms for a specific engagement, that document takes precedence.
1. Services covered by these terms
MTIS provides services relating to the performance of materials in service. These terms apply to all of them, including:
- Failure investigation. MTIS examines the available evidence of a failure, performs essential testing to collect further evidence, and analyses that evidence to identify the failure mode, the fundamental mechanism and, where the evidence supports it, the root cause.
- Failure analysis. A more limited review, often desk-based, with no significant additional testing unless agreed.
- Corrosion and integrity. Damage-mechanism interpretation supporting integrity, life-extension and repair-or-replace decisions.
- Materials selection. Selection, substitution, verification and fitness assessment of materials against service requirements.
- Characterisation and testing. Test-programme design, delivery through independently selected specialist laboratories, and interpretation of results.
- Expert review. Independent technical review of investigation reports, test results and laboratory work.
- Bespoke manufacturing and repair solutions. Alternative manufacturing route development and engineering support for repair decisions.
- Training, advisory and representation. Training courses, standing advisory support, and representation acting on a client's behalf, including as an expert witness or third-party inspector.
- Failure Investigator. The MTIS subscription software application, governed additionally by sections 10 to 16 below.
- Professional review. Review of Failure Investigator output by an MTIS engineer, purchased separately from any subscription.
2. Quotations, orders and acceptance
A quotation is an offer by MTIS to provide the services specified in it, subject to the terms in the quotation and these terms. Quotations are issued as a PDF document sent by email. The client must return a signed copy of the quotation to the MTIS project lead before any work begins.
Work does not commence, and MTIS accepts no obligation, until a signed quotation has been received and, where samples are required, those samples have arrived.
3. Price, invoicing and payment
Quoted prices should not be taken as inclusive of delivery charges, taxes, duties, liabilities or the cost of returning materials unless MTIS states otherwise in writing. The client is responsible for any taxes and duties not specified in the quotation.
Prices are not subject to change without the prior written consent of both parties. Every invoice carries the price specified in the quotation, or any variation agreed by both parties, together with the relevant MTIS project code. The project code appears on MTIS documentation and is available from the MTIS project lead on request.
No additional charges — including transportation, packaging or delivery — are accepted without prior MTIS approval.
Payment is due within 30 days of invoice. MTIS does not accept back-to-back payment arrangements unless the quotation explicitly states otherwise. Payment remains due in full even where the expected cause or result is not identified, because the work is the service, not the outcome.
4. Delivery, timescales and samples
The client is responsible for delivering samples and materials to MTIS. Work cannot start until materials have been received, and MTIS accepts no responsibility for delays caused by delivery problems. Delivery of samples to MTIS facilities is at the client's expense.
Where no timeframe is specified, MTIS will work to its standard period of one working week wherever practicable. Given the nature of investigative work, MTIS does not accept liability or costs arising from delays in delivering results.
MTIS retains samples, results and materials for six months following project completion, after which they may be disposed of. Samples are not returned unless the quotation states otherwise.
5. Information the client must provide
MTIS endeavours to provide accurate results and interpretation. Because of the nature of the work, errors may nonetheless occur, and MTIS accepts no liability for them. To limit that risk the client must supply as much relevant information as possible, and as a minimum:
- the purpose of the investigation;
- the nature of any samples provided;
- the process and environment the samples came from;
- any safety-related information, including hazardous residues or contamination;
- any other test data already collected.
Withholding safety-related information may endanger MTIS personnel and laboratory staff, and the client remains responsible for the consequences of doing so.
6. Quality standards
Work is carried out to recognised specifications, such as BSI or ASTM standards, where the client specifically identifies them in the quotation. Otherwise work is carried out to a quality level judged sufficient by MTIS. Except where the quotation states otherwise, MTIS is the sole arbitrator of the quality of, and compliance with specification of, all items, materials, data and analysis.
7. Results, limitations and liability
Failure investigation and related services do not guarantee a particular result. Characterisation and testing methods have limited accuracy and sensitivity; sample preparation, sample condition and the area examined all affect what can be found. MTIS is a professional team, but the limits of sampling and inspection mean that trace evidence is not always detected.
Given the nature of the work, MTIS is not liable for losses arising from its services or from the acts of its personnel, whether direct or indirect. The client agrees to indemnify MTIS against loss incurred or damage suffered, whether directly or indirectly, as a result of the actions of MTIS personnel. Nothing in these terms limits liability that cannot lawfully be limited under Malaysian law.
8. Use of findings
MTIS reports and findings must be used only for the purpose stated for the engagement, unless the quotation or agreed terms state otherwise. Reports must not be reproduced in part in a way that changes their meaning, and must not be presented as endorsing a conclusion MTIS did not reach.
9. Prohibition against gratification
Clients, vendors and their agents are prohibited from giving gratification, in cash or in kind, to any MTIS employee or agent. Discovery of such practices entitles MTIS to withhold services, terminate any and all contracts without further notice and without detriment to MTIS interests, and seek redress for resulting losses.
10. Intellectual property
MTIS intellectual property extends across the whole business, not merely this website. Subject to section 11, MTIS owns or licenses all rights in:
- its investigation methods, analytical approaches, decision logic and assessment frameworks;
- report templates, work-scope templates, calculation sheets, drawings, test plans and checklists;
- photographs, micrographs and other imagery produced by MTIS;
- databases, taxonomies, knowledge packs, failure-mode libraries and reference datasets;
- software, algorithms, prompts, models and configuration, including the Failure Investigator application;
- training materials and course content;
- proprietary know-how, and the MTIS name, logo and brand assets.
Nothing in an engagement transfers ownership of MTIS intellectual property. Where MTIS supplies a deliverable, the client receives a non-exclusive, non-transferable licence to use it for the purpose stated in the engagement. That licence does not permit resale, sub-licensing, publication as the client's own work, or use to develop a competing service. Website content — text, images, graphics, and the MTIS name and logo — belongs to MTIS or is used with permission and may not be reproduced commercially without written consent. Technical images remain subject to their recorded source and clearance conditions.
11. Client information and project data
These terms distinguish four categories, and each is treated differently:
- Pre-existing MTIS intellectual property — everything in section 10 that MTIS brings to the engagement. It remains MTIS property throughout.
- Client-supplied information — drawings, specifications, operating history, correspondence, samples and any other material the client provides. It remains the client's property. MTIS may use it only to perform the engagement, and holds it in confidence.
- Project-specific data — evidence records, photographs of the client's components, test results and measurements generated during the engagement. The client may use this freely for its own purposes.
- Deliverables — the report, findings and recommendations, licensed to the client under section 10.
MTIS may retain anonymised, aggregated technical learning — such as the relationship between a material, an environment and a failure mechanism — to improve its methods and knowledge base. Such learning never includes the client's identity, the site, asset identifiers, commercial information or any content that could identify the client or the case, and its retention is subject to confidentiality obligations, applicable data-protection law and any contractual restriction agreed for the engagement. Where an engagement requires stricter treatment, the quotation or a separate confidentiality agreement governs.
MTIS treats client work as confidential and does not publish case material, client names or site identifiers without written permission.
12. Failure Investigator — access and subscriptions
Failure Investigator is a subscription software application. Basic, Standard and Expert plans, and their investigation allowances, file limits, AI clarification rounds and report entitlements, are published on the pricing and limits page and form part of these terms.
Standard and Expert subscriptions are personal to one named user. Password and account sharing are prohibited. Organisations may purchase multiple named-user subscriptions under one organisation account; broader shared-access arrangements are agreed case by case.
There is no free trial and subscriptions do not renew automatically. Payment is confirmed manually by MTIS. A term begins only when payment is confirmed and the account is activated — not when payment is submitted or an order is placed. Renewal takes effect only after a new payment is confirmed. Subscription fees are non-refundable after activation unless MTIS agrees otherwise; this does not affect statutory rights that cannot lawfully be excluded.
Unused investigation, upload and AI allowances expire at the end of the term and do not roll over.
13. Failure Investigator — permitted and prohibited use
All plans are restricted to genuine, current failure investigations. The following are prohibited: fictitious or invented cases, research-paper or textbook examples, bulk uploading of company history, and deliberate consumption of AI tokens or clarification rounds. Users are warned at 80% of an allowance; AI access is paused at 100%, or earlier on an abuse trigger, pending review.
Users must not attempt to circumvent plan limits, share credentials, upload malicious files, or upload material they have no right to disclose. File types excluded on every tier include macro-enabled Office files, archives, executables, scripts, video and audio.
Users are responsible for ensuring they have the right to upload the material they submit, including any client confidentiality or export-control obligation attaching to it.
14. Failure Investigator — AI-assisted output
Failure Investigator output is AI-assisted and is not automatically reviewed by an MTIS engineer. Every app-generated report and final-results screen states this. Output is a structured aid to an investigation, not a professional engineering opinion, and must not be relied on as one.
Professional review by an MTIS engineer is a separate service, purchased independently of any subscription. Only output that has been through professional review carries MTIS professional judgement.
The AI limitations page forms part of these terms.
15. Failure Investigator — case data, retention and deletion
Case data is deleted from the live system 90 days after the case's last activity, where technically practical, with a warning sent seven days beforehand. An extension may be requested from MTIS.
Live deletion, backup retention and restoration are distinct. Deletion removes case content from the live system; secure, dated backups may retain a copy for longer for disaster-recovery purposes, and are not routinely searchable or accessible on demand. Restoration after live deletion is a bespoke paid service and MTIS cannot guarantee it will be possible. After a case is deleted MTIS keeps only the minimum billing, entitlement and audit records required — not case content.
Full detail is set out in the Failure Investigator privacy and data handling notice.
16. Failure Investigator — availability, suspension and changes
MTIS does not warrant uninterrupted or error-free availability. Maintenance, updates and changes to the application, the underlying AI models and the knowledge base may occur without notice, and may alter output between versions.
MTIS may suspend or terminate access where these terms are breached, where use falls outside the fair-use boundary, or where required by law. Where suspension follows an allowance or abuse trigger, access is restored on review if the account is in order.
17. Who we are
This website and the Failure Investigator application are operated by MTIS Sdn. Bhd. (Company No. 200901041346 / 0884496-U), F-1-03 (A), Level 3, Block F, SetiaWalk, Persiaran Wawasan, Pusat Bandar Puchong, 47160 Puchong, Selangor, Malaysia ("MTIS", "we", "us") — a materials engineering consultancy.
18. Use of this website
You may browse this website and use its content for your own information. Content here is general technical and commercial information about MTIS and materials engineering topics. It does not constitute engineering advice for any specific situation, and you should not act on it as a substitute for case-specific professional engagement. External links are provided for convenience; MTIS is not responsible for external content.
MTIS works to keep this website accurate but makes no warranty that its general content fits your circumstances. To the extent permitted by law, MTIS accepts no liability for loss arising from reliance on website content as opposed to contracted professional advice.
19. Enquiries do not create an engagement
Submitting an enquiry or job request through this website does not create a contract or professional engagement. MTIS work proceeds only under a written scope and terms agreed for each project. Until such terms are agreed, MTIS has no obligation in respect of information you send, other than the confidentiality practice described in our Privacy Notice.
20. Governing law
These terms are governed by the laws of Malaysia unless MTIS states otherwise in writing, and the Malaysian courts have jurisdiction.
21. Changes
MTIS may update these terms. The date below records the current version, and the terms in force at the date of a signed quotation govern that engagement.