Karin Fent, Author at 麻豆原创 News Center Company & Customer Stories | 麻豆原创 Room Fri, 06 Dec 2024 14:39:02 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.9.4 STIHL Optimizes Sales and Production Planning Across Subsidiaries with 麻豆原创 /2024/12/stihl-optimizes-sales-production-planning/ Mon, 02 Dec 2024 13:15:00 +0000 /?p=230192 Grown from a one-man business into a global leader, develops, manufactures, and distributes power tools for professional forestry and agriculture, garden and landscape maintenance, the construction sector, and private garden owners. The product range is complemented by digital solutions and services. Products are distributed through authorized dealers and STIHL鈥檚 own online shops 鈥 which will be expanded internationally over the next few years 鈥 including 43 sales and marketing subsidiaries, about 120 importers, and more than 55,000 servicing dealers in over 160 countries.

Founded in 1926 and with headquarters in southern Germany, STIHL has been the world’s top-selling chain saw brand since 1971. With a workforce of almost 20,000 employees, the family-owned business generated 5.3 billion euros in revenue in 2023.

Siloed Supply Chain Planning Insufficient for Informed Decision-Making

In the past, STIHL鈥檚 subsidiaries and production companies relied on their own 麻豆原创 ERP Central Component (麻豆原创 ECC) systems, deployed on premise, with a heterogenous landscape for supply chain planning processes across 35 sales and eight production companies that were tailored to the needs of each subsidiary.

鈥淲e lacked an end-to-end, consolidated view and overall transparency to improve decision-making for the company as a whole and not only for one subsidiary,鈥 said Lena Domhan, global process owner for Integrated Planning at STIHL. 鈥淧reviously, we spent a lot of time analyzing and verifying data and had no single source of truth. In addition, disconnected planning systems hindered collaboration and coordination between subsidiaries.鈥

With the introduction of new product lines with integrated batteries, STIHL found itself in a new business, selling to end customers also. 鈥淭his VUCA world required us to react even faster to volatility and changing demand,鈥 explained Axel Erhard, senior vice president, global ONE STIHL program lead. 鈥淭o optimize planning, we needed a better overview of the different production and sales companies.鈥

The company established the ONE STIHL program with the goal to consolidate all subsystems across all sales and production companies into one integrated 麻豆原创 S/4HANA system. Moreover, STIHL aims to bring several solutions into one hybrid ecosystem, such as the solution (麻豆原创 IBP) with the applications for sales and operations and response and supply, the , and 麻豆原创 Transportation Management. 鈥淥ne goal of the ONE STIHL project is to reduce fixed capital and get more transparency on different management levels. 麻豆原创 IBP with 麻豆原创 S/4HANA Manufacturing for planning and scheduling play crucial roles in this process, serving as the starting point for planning,” Erhard said.

麻豆原创 Integrated Business Planning for Supply Chain: the cornerstone of a risk-resilient supply chain

Synchronized Planning Approach for Distribution Center Refills

鈥淲e were one of the first customers to introduce 麻豆原创 IBP in combination with 麻豆原创 S/4HANA Manufacturing for planning and scheduling and 麻豆原创 Transportation Management,鈥 explained Fabio Fender, interim global process owner for Integrated Planning at STIHL. 鈥淲ith real-time integration, our planners can quickly react. For example, when tackling issues on the planning or production side, they immediately see the impact on the distribution side and vice versa. That provides confidence and trust.鈥

Georg Fuchs, director of Integrated Planning and global solution architect, ONE STIHL project, added: 鈥淥rder-based planning and real-time integration are the heartbeat of our production. For instance, in Austria, finished goods are produced and then shipped to distribution centers in Germany or the Czech Republic. The order-based planning process in 麻豆原创 IBP is used to allocate, prioritize, and schedule the delivery of these goods. We are decoupling this from our production plan in 麻豆原创 S/4HANA Manufacturing for planning and scheduling.鈥

With this synchronized planning approach, STIHL consolidates supply planning, distribution planning, and production planning into one seamless process, enabling a holistic workspace for planners. Detailed scheduling results from 麻豆原创 S/4HANA Manufacturing for planning and scheduling are visible in 麻豆原创 IBP in real time, helping to ensure maximum transparency. In addition, the integration of 麻豆原创 Transportation Management allows for the creation of freight orders to ship STIHL鈥檚 finished products. 鈥淪TIHL鈥檚 vertically integrated supply chain gives us the potential for end-to-end control,鈥 Erhard said.

Higher Transparency Enables Accurate Planning

麻豆原创 IBP is live at two production sites in Austria and Switzerland and is used by several planners and others utilizing its reporting capabilities. 鈥淭he integration with 麻豆原创 S/4HANA Manufacturing for planning and scheduling and 麻豆原创 Transportation Management was the most effective solution to meet our business needs,鈥 Fuchs said.

STIHL already recognizes and anticipates a range of immediate and long-term benefits, including:

  • Better visibility across subsidiaries, enabling accurate and feasible plans that can adapt to production constraints
  • Increased efficiency with sales and production teams using the same system with one source of truth for all relevant data
  • End-to end transparency for global planning processes with optimized planning for the network 
  • Time savings for planners who see real-time impact of changes and can instantly make better-informed decisions
  • Creation of feasible production plans to meet customer demand
  • Real-time integration with 麻豆原创 S/4HANA Manufacturing for planning and scheduling ensures planners and production teams are using the same data for decision-making
  • Logistics planners can efficiently plan truck load orders and promptly fulfill logistics requirements
  • Improved customer service while reducing inventory costs through network planning
  • Enhanced decision-making between quantity and revenue planning provides a crucial element to business processes and reporting

Future Plans and Leveraging AI

鈥淲e have four to five rollouts ahead of us on our journey. Over the next few years, we will integrate about 43 global subsidiaries into one network planning solution,鈥 Domhan said.

In relation to the utilization of artificial intelligence (AI), Erhard said, 鈥淪TIHL will invest in AI in the future. That is a clear focus of our owners.鈥

鈥淲e are starting to explore potential opportunities to determine what would benefit us. However, regarding 麻豆原创 IBP, we are already fit for the future,鈥 Fender concluded.


Karin Fent is senior director of global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.
Top photo courtesy of STIHL

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Weir Minerals Optimized Customer Service by Digitalizing Field Service Management and Data Collection /2024/10/weir-minerals-optimized-customer-service-field-service-management/ Mon, 21 Oct 2024 12:15:00 +0000 /?p=228919 With a commitment to sustainability, Weir Minerals, a part of The Weir Group plc, has more than 11,000 employees across 60 countries. The mining equipment manufacturer helps customers work to their fullest, most sustainable potential.

The company develops engineering solutions for mineral and mining technology markets. Servicing a regionally distributed clientele across geographies, Weir Minerals depends on a synchronized web of data processing and analysis systems that give it the right balance of foresight and agility to sustainably manage customer data. Operating through an integrated system of tech hubs, manufacturing operations, and local service centers, the company creates sustainability solutions that help track the lifecycle of mining equipment, predict part deterioration, and minimize detrimental environmental impacts.

However, Weir Minerals had been using isolated, offline sources, like spreadsheets, to store records and data. 鈥淥ur paper-based methods and siloed process put us at a disadvantage,鈥 said Karun Naidoo, global process owner service at Weir Minerals.

The reliance on siloed data sources left the company 鈥 and ultimately its customers 鈥 vulnerable to risks. This inefficient approach to collecting and processing data and inventory planning was time-consuming, error-prone, and difficult to adapt to changing circumstances. Often, technicians had to travel from location to location to collect necessary customer audit data. By the time that data was properly categorized, it was largely outdated, preventing the company from making agile supply chain decisions, like having the foresight to order specific spare parts for aging machines. Additionally, employees had to focus on completing paperwork and other low-value tasks, which was time-consuming and prevented them from focusing on giving customers the desired service level. This inefficiency and a lack of central digitalization left customers wanting more.

鈥淭o remediate our relationships with customers and continue our sustainability mission, we needed to digitalize our core infrastructure to match modern technology and data analysis standards,鈥 Naidoo remarked.

Revitalizing Data Processing Environments to Enhance Agility

As a long-standing 麻豆原创 customer, Weir Minerals, conducted an internal evaluation to find a solution within 麻豆原创’s portfolio that could meet its unique inventory planning and data processing needs. The team found that was ideal for the widespread remote workforce due to its centralized and digitalized hubs, which could help prevent manual errors, reduce silos, and improve transparency.

Empower your field service team with 麻豆原创 Field Service Management

鈥淏esides 麻豆原创 Field Service Management we also use the customer service functionality of the 麻豆原创 ERP application,鈥 Naidoo said. With that, customer recommendations can be included much faster and more precisely with an improved view of relevant service information.

The integration of 麻豆原创 Field Service Management and 麻豆原创 ERP helped Weir Minerals create digital customer service history reports and improve communication between the back office and field technicians, facilitating the collection and analysis of real-time, centralized data. The company also established a change management framework for internal project ownership.

With both solutions, the company enhanced its internal data collection infrastructure with a digitalized channel that provides real-time insights without excess, time-consuming, manual processes. The solutions allow technicians to make vital service notes in a digital environment instead of on paper, which improves data availability for both personnel and customers. Through a greater level of communication in terms of audits, supply, and demand, the company saw聽that 麻豆原创 Field Service Management could meet the needs of its widespread remote workforce.

Weir Minerals can better forecast demand by monitoring machine lifespan and inventory data, allowing it to swiftly provide customers with solutions instead of relying on outdated information. Once the company could establish real-time visibility in multiple environments, including on mobile devices in the field, it could improve efficiency and satisfy its customers more effectively.

Creating Agile Analysis Environments to Forecast Supply and Demand

Weir Minerals has seen significant business improvements since implementing 麻豆原创 Field Service Management integrated with 麻豆原创 ERP.

Data veracity and visibility are critical; the solutions let the business digitally collect and analyze customer data, helping to create predictive models to outline product demand, maintenance, and quality and generate service history reports. 麻豆原创 Field Service Management also enables the company to use a built-in digital data integration that facilitates smoother analysis on the backend.

Technicians can upload daily digital reports from both mobile and site-based devices, leading to increased data richness. These reports make data analysis and collection much faster, improve communication between technicians and the backend, and eliminate time-consuming, error-prone paper processes.聽

The readily available reports and digitalized channels of data recording help both field employees and customers better understand how customers use equipment. This informs sustainability measures and allows personnel to better predict trends in customer spare part demand. Through sophisticated, digitalized data insights, the company can determine that proper part inventory is available at the right warehouse, allowing it to quickly meet customer needs.

The solution setup and mobile integration capabilities further empower Weir Minerals employees to drive change and digital adoption in the field. This improves customer satisfaction with enhanced data analytics and digitalized ability to implement smoother and more relevant sustainability measures into customers鈥 operations.

Overall, data availability and agility are appealing to customers that demand transparency and clear service history reports. This led to:

  • 40% greater satisfaction with better-quality data and service
  • 70% time saved when generating customer service reports
  • 50% more timely reports with real-time timesheets and parts records

Broadening 麻豆原创 Portfolio to Further Optimize Planning Processes

After the successful implementation of 麻豆原创 Field Service Management integrated with 麻豆原创 ERP, Weir Minerals now plans to utilize more data management, available-to-promise, and inventory planning solutions from 麻豆原创 to help increase digitalization, product availability, and data accuracy.

It鈥檚 also looking at for enhanced logistics planning and transportation processes across its global enterprise. No matter how its technological framework evolves in a modern industry, Weir Minerals is dedicated to its sustainability efforts and aims to use the improved infrastructure for eco-friendly mining operations.

鈥淭hrough the adoption of 麻豆原创 Field Service Management along with 麻豆原创 ERP, we successfully digitalized manual processes and improved availability of real-time data as well as enterprise-wide communication,鈥 Naidoo concluded. 鈥淥ur technicians can now focus on value-adding activities and raising service levels, ultimately leading to greater customer satisfaction and operational efficiency.鈥


Karin Fent is senior director for Global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

Photo courtesy of Weir Minerals

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Equinor Boosts Asset Performance with Condition-Based Maintenance Enabled by 麻豆原创 Asset Performance Management /2024/08/equinor-condition-based-maintenance-sap-asset-performance-management/ Mon, 26 Aug 2024 13:15:00 +0000 /?p=227903 Present in 30 countries and the largest energy company in Norway, Equinor provides energy for 170 million people daily and operates the world鈥檚 largest integrated offshore pipeline system. It is the and the third-largest net seller of crude oil in the world. In 2022, the company celebrated 50 years of turning natural resources into energy for people and progress for society.

From Manual to Machine-Driven Processes

In the past, Equinor had relied on manual processes for decision-making in asset management, but as the company expanded, it began embracing a data-driven approach, using automated dashboards. However, its decision-makers recognized the need for further advancements and envisioned adopting condition-based maintenance (CBM).

麻豆原创 Asset Performance Management: Optimize asset health, performance, and risk

This transformation would allow for a more autonomous, machine-led, and data-driven approach to asset management, freeing up valuable internal resources and enabling team members to handle multiple cases simultaneously.

鈥淓quinor wanted to progress from condition monitoring to condition-based maintenance,鈥 Tom Naastad Svennevig, lead engineer at Equinor, explained. 鈥淔or the past eight or nine years, we have operated a monitoring center where a few equipment groups are being monitored by use of home-grown dashboards as well as third-party expert systems. However, as the number of plants onboarded to the center increased, it required more and more resources. We believe that applying condition-based maintenance on equipment where it is possible to connect a remedial action to a degradation mechanism will relieve the resources working in the monitoring center.鈥

CBM is paradigm shift in asset management, allowing companies to move from traditional calendar-based maintenance schedules to a proactive approach powered by data-driven insights. While traditional maintenance strategies often lead to unplanned downtime, CBM empowers operators make informed decisions based on real-time equipment condition, mitigating disruptions and maximizing asset reliability.

鈥淭he primary purpose of condition-based maintenance for us is to provide confidence for continued safe operation and avoid disruption,鈥 Svennevig added. 鈥淲e believe that several degradation mechanisms we had in the past can be detected automatically, and actions being taken without human intervention.鈥

Benefits of an Integrated Solution

For Equinor, stood out as a superior choice, offering a range of tangible benefits, particularly, according the Equinor manager: 鈥淚n contrast to third-party solutions that require data migration, 麻豆原创 Asset Performance Management seamlessly integrates with existing 麻豆原创 systems, eliminating the need for redundant data entry and ensuring data accuracy across all platforms.鈥

Other benefits that Equinor perceives include:

  • Reduced administrative burdens and increased overall efficiency
  • Automatic updating of asset information across all relevant components
  • Importing equipment condition status from third-party expert systems
  • Storing evidence for safe operation and triggering actions for degraded conditions
  • Generating notifications based on condition monitoring rules for prompt responses to potential equipment issues
  • Seamless ingestion of sensor data from field systems into 麻豆原创 Asset Performance Management
  • Pre-assigning tasks to maintenance notifications based on asset strategies and failure modes
  • Empowering maintenance teams to act swiftly and effectively, minimizing downtime and preventing potential equipment failures Seamless scaling to accommodate additional equipment and assets

Optimizing Asset Status Visualization with 麻豆原创 Asset Performance Management

Effectively visualizing asset status is crucial for making timely and well-informed decisions, which is why 麻豆原创 Asset Performance Management offers comprehensive dashboarding capabilities through embedded . This allows users to select specific assets or entire fleets for a detailed overview in a centralized view, which enables quick identification of potential issues and facilitates proactive maintenance interventions.

The dashboard utilizes clear, intuitive labels to indicate asset health status, ranging from 鈥渆xcellent鈥 to 鈥渦nacceptable,鈥 which streamlines decision-making. Critical alerts are prominently displayed in orange, immediately grabbing the attention of maintenance personnel, and providing necessary context and guidance, ensuring that timely and appropriate actions are taken.

Additionally, the dashboard seamlessly integrates with Equinor鈥檚 wider 麻豆原创 ecosystem, enabling real-time data exchange and integration with existing maintenance processes.

Effective Change Management: Important for CBM Implementation

Equinor has implemented a CBM-driven maintenance approach. CBM is running in production. The job to roll out the solution has started. The process of change management is main focus going forward.

鈥淲e will achieve this through clear leadership commitment, comprehensive communication, a pilot project for proof of concept, streamlined data smoothing for accurate monitoring, role redefinition for CBM management, establishment of KPIs for continuous improvement, and employee empowerment through involvement,鈥 the Equinor manager explained. 鈥淥ur objective is that this will result in transitioning to a proactive maintenance approach for 40% of our equipment and significant reductions in maintenance costs and asset downtime.鈥

鈥溌槎乖 Asset Performance Management helps us streamlining maintenance processes and facilitating proactive preventive maintenance,鈥 Svennevig concluded.


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

Top image courtesy of Equinor | Ole J酶rgen Bratland 漏 Equinor

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aquatherm Improves Operations with 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing /2024/06/aquatherm-improves-operations-sap-digital-manufacturing/ Fri, 21 Jun 2024 12:15:00 +0000 /?p=226156 Have you ever thought about how a piping system can contribute to climate protection?

Based in Germany, aquatherm is a global manufacturer of polypropylene pipe systems for plant construction and building services. Polypropylene is a material known for its ecological properties and high temperature and pressure resistance.

Climate protection, green energy, and clean water: with all these, wants to contribute to preserving the natural foundations of life everywhere in the world. Its sustainable products, comprehensive service, and expert knowledge are part of its commitment to a climate-neutral life. The production line covers 17,000 articles across six lines for various applications, such as connection to heating and cooling, heating and cooling networks, and potable water.

With about 500 employees, the company operates in 70 countries via a strong partner network.

In 2022, aquatherm implemented as its core business system and integrated a legacy solution to manage its production processes. But it heavily relied on manual data input, resulting in poor data quality and a high risk of human error. To meet increasing demand for its products and keep up with the company’s growth, aquatherm aimed to optimize its production processes by incorporating the latest technology.

Streamlining Operations and Automating Processes

Patrick Keller, 麻豆原创 technical consultant, Digital Manufacturing, aquatherm, explained: “We wanted to streamline operations across nine manufacturing divisions and six production lines, minimize manual input, reduce interfaces, and track performance on the production floor. Our objective was also to gain visibility into machine activities, comparing key performance indicators across machines, workers, and production areas. In addition, we wanted to establish comprehensive traceability throughout the production process to swiftly address any issues.鈥

The solution was to implement a cutting-edge manufacturing execution system that was adaptable for the future and able to eliminate any manufacturing errors quickly by leveraging real-time machine data and KPIs. “After careful consideration, we decided to utilize 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing for collecting machine data to automate processes. Overall, our intention is to utilize as many products as possible within the 麻豆原创 cosmos,鈥 Keller said.

Sustainable, risk-resilient manufacturing is here

is a manufacturing execution system (MES) provided as a cloud solution that can support sustainable, risk-resilient manufacturing operations through a resource-efficient, Industry 4.0 approach. It helps optimize production processes by connecting the business systems with the shop floor equipment and can enable execution, visibility, and analysis.

Establishing a Single Source of Truth to Improve Visibility

麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing is currently implemented at one of the production areas, providing aquatherm with insight into machine performance and any issues that arise. It allows the company to check indicators from machines, like production times, and helps reduce downtime. As 麻豆原创 S/4HANA Cloud is integrated with 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing, information is pulled from 麻豆原创 S/4HANA Cloud and transferred back from 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing, enabling real-time insights to help improve decision-making.

鈥淲e appreciate the benefits of this cloud-based solution, as we get quarterly software updates and new features,鈥 Keller said.

One of the challenges aquatherm faced was obtaining necessary and correct machine data from various machine manufacturers with different standards. By working with 麻豆原创 and its partner , it developed a standard machine template to use for each machine. 鈥淏y utilizing the , we avoided custom development and stayed within our existing processes without the need for significant change to production processes,鈥 Keller said. 鈥淲ith support of BA Business Advice, we went live within only six months, after a three-month proof of concept,鈥 he added.

The overall benefits aquatherm achieved include:

  • Achieved a 100% unified overview of manufacturing operations
  • Experienced 90% less time spent on PC-based tasks through automated data exchange, freeing machine operators to focus on their core role
  • Established a single source of truth for manufacturing operations, significantly improving visibility
  • Improved data quality and freed up time for machine operators by eliminating manual processes and interfaces
  • Empowered key stakeholders with accurate, real-time data for more transparent production management and informed decision-making
  • Laid the foundations for enhanced data analytics and AI solutions to support future optimizations, helping to boost overall production efficiency

Future Plans to Boost Overall Production Efficiency

Looking to the future, aquatherm plans to roll out the solution across all production areas. Moreover, it plans to leverage the to even better control production operations and further integrate the 麻豆原创 S/4HANA Cloud data exchange with 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing in both directions. It also plans to utilize and the to help exchange data between 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing and industry-specific standard data sources.  

鈥溌槎乖 Digital Manufacturing has enabled us to digitalize and automate our production processes thanks to a single source of truth. Accurate, real-time data ensures that there are no blind spots, so we can keep our operations running smoothly,鈥 Keller said.


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

Top photo courtesy of aquatherm.

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How Preh Eases Product Costing for Hundreds of Projects with 麻豆原创 /2024/04/how-preh-eases-product-costing/ Tue, 30 Apr 2024 13:15:00 +0000 /?p=224180 , a subsidiary of Joyson Electronics in Ningbo, China, is a manufacturer of high-quality automotive electronics systems. With more than 100 years of experience in the electronics industry and over 40 years in the automotive sector, the Germany-based company has the perfect combination of access to growth markets, deep technical know-how, and cost efficiency.

Preh is a global growth company with five sales locations, six production plants, and a strong market position in the automotive market for human-machine interface and e-mobility systems.

With constant company growth and ever-changing market requirements, the product lifecycle costing at Preh had reached its limits. 鈥淲e are on the way to becoming a 鈧2 billion company and did product costing without the support of a fully integrated data processing system,鈥 recalls Harald Bayer, department head of Project Calculation at Preh Group. 鈥淔or our management, it was now time to give the calculation of all our new products a new basis.鈥

The company knew it needed a single source of truth for all product cost information that would also enable analysis and support reporting. 

Introducing a Future-Proof Standard Solution

鈥淲e looked at several software solutions on the market and our choice was 麻豆原创 Product Lifecycle Costing. As we are trusting on the strength of 麻豆原创, this was a decision for the future,鈥 Bayer says. 鈥淎n 麻豆原创 standard solution is a better fit with our system landscape.鈥

According to Bayer, key objectives for the project were:

  • Replace former processes with a standardized process across the company
  • Improve quality and accuracy for product costing along the product lifecycle
  • Increase cost transparency for reporting and analysis to easily identify cost drivers
  • Increase speed and flexibility in the product costing process and the efficiency of the entire organization

helps companies gain visibility across teams, calculate and proactively manage costs, and support new product innovations and customer-specific engineered products.

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Consulting by 麻豆原创: Quick-Start Service for 麻豆原创 Product Lifecycle Costing

A Central Database for Product and Project Calculation

鈥淚n the first step, 麻豆原创 Product Lifecycle Costing was implemented at our headquarters in Germany. Currently, we are doing the global rollout. This includes all business units at all locations and development centers, with the goal to set a common standard with global software,鈥 Bayer says. 鈥淲e want to make it available for all users involved in the product costing process. Therefore, we will train a large part of the entire PDP organization. There will be only one database.鈥 He added: 鈥淭he solution is integrated with our 麻豆原创 ERP system that is a single global instance.鈥

麻豆原创 Product Lifecycle Costing: Improve profits by managing costs accurately

To support various stakeholders in the most efficient manner, Preh created different apps and layouts within 麻豆原创 Product Lifecycle Costing, such as a quality checker that helps avoid errors and therefore increase the quality of the costing result as well as a material price app in which the purchasing department can enter material prices that are automatically transferred into the database. In addition, 麻豆原创 Services and Support supported the company in developing different reports and an interface to provide up-to-date material prices.

Preh also created additional reports and analyses, which helped provide more transparency thanks to different views.

Increased Transparency Helps Identify Cost Drivers, Optimize Design

In terms of the value Preh gained, 鈥淭he main benefit is transparency,” Bayer says. “We can do analyses and reporting by pushing a button. With that, we know everything about cost drivers and can see the entire product costing. We can easily make comparisons between different calculations and see cost bridges, which was a lot of effort in the past.”

Leveraging the new database, the company can get an easier overview of which parts are used in which project; get up-to-date purchasing price information twice a day; examine calculations and prices of specific years; and make more precise product and project calculations.

From a business perspective, this means:

  • Increased competitiveness, thanks to cost transparency and insight into cost drivers to make better design decisions
  • Quick access to accurate product costing information
  • Major time savings as master data is automatically replicated from 麻豆原创 ERP, allowing employees to focus on cost improvements

鈥淲e can easily identify our cost drivers for working closely with development, purchasing, and our suppliers on the cost drivers to be more competitive in customer quotes,鈥 Bayer comments.

By the end of the year, Preh plans to leverage 麻豆原创 Product Lifecycle Costing to calculate more than a hundred projects with up to 10 different product variants 鈥 and many more later. 鈥淭he choice of 麻豆原创 Product Lifecycle Costing was the right decision,鈥 Bayer says. 鈥淲e were able to increase quality and accuracy in our processes and take an important step in our overall digitalization efforts.鈥


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success for Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

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How Chemicals Supplier BYK Harmonized Supply Chain Planning Processes /2024/04/byk-harmonized-supply-chain-planning-processes/ Thu, 04 Apr 2024 12:15:00 +0000 /?p=223905 is a leading global supplier of specialty chemicals. The company鈥檚 innovative additives and differentiated solutions optimize product and material properties as well as production and application processes. Amongst other products, BYK鈥檚 high-performance additives improve scratch resistance and surface gloss, the mechanical strength or flow behavior of materials, and properties such as UV and light stability or flame retardancy. BYK also produces measuring and testing instruments that serve to effectively assess appearance and physical properties.

To better react to market changes and expand its competitive edge, BYK saw the need to select and implement a new supply chain demand planning system.

Integrated Approach to Address Demand Planning Processes Holistically

The company was challenged with inefficient, diversified, and isolated supply chain demand planning processes on disparate legacy planning systems that impeded forecast accuracy. Therefore, the goal was to enhance data and process transparency and establish one source of truth for sales, operations, and demand-planning processes.

Create accurate demand plans with the support of 麻豆原创

BYK found that the , a cloud-based application with comprehensive capabilities, could best meet its goals to harmonize demand planning processes across the organization and improve forecast accuracy. In addition, the company decided to use the , enabling the company to get real-time visibility and control over its supply chain.

For the implementation and deep solution know-how, BYK sought help from and the 麻豆原创 Preferred Success service, which included architecture planning, implementation guidance, and process reengineering expertise. Moreover, 麻豆原创 helped deploy 麻豆原创 Integrated Business Planning for demand and 麻豆原创 Supply Chain Control Tower in a technically standardized and lean way.

Enabling All Functions with a Single Source of Truth to Improve Decision-Making

Major benefits BYK achieved include:

  • Improved collaboration by implementing a harmonized and automated demand planning process
  • Simplified and integrated planning practices for sales, demand planning, supply chain management, controlling, and strategic supply planning teams with more than 200 users
  • One platform as a single source of truth for improved data quality and process transparency across sales, operations, and demand-planning processes
  • Increased forecast accuracy with real-time data reflecting changes to planned demand
  • Quantity- and value-based planning for all planning teams to make decisions based on financial impact

鈥淲ith 麻豆原创 Services and Support, we successfully implemented 麻豆原创 Integrated Business Planning for demand and 麻豆原创 Supply Chain Control Tower, enabling precise and accurate demand planning,” said Matthias Beenen, Supply Chain Process Management, BYK. “This is critical to supply chain efficiency and for delivering high quality service to our customers.鈥

鈥淚n the future, we will continuously work on optimizing the implemented processes and extend 麻豆原创 Integrated Business Planning for demand by adding subsequent supply chain planning processes,鈥 he concluded.


Karin Fent is senior director of Customer Success for Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

Top image courtesy of BYK.

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The Importance of Intelligent Asset Management and Maintenance for Petrobras /2024/03/petrobras-sap-intelligent-asset-management-maintenance/ Fri, 01 Mar 2024 13:15:00 +0000 /?p=222818 Petrobras, a , recognized the critical importance of intelligent asset management and maintenance in achieving its vision of being the best diversified and integrated energy company.

To address the challenges of manual processes, lack of accurate information, and decentralization of maintenance processes, Petrobras sought help from 麻豆原创 to implement an innovative new solution.

The Need for Transparency of Asset Management Processes and Value Chain

The company’s use of manual spreadsheets and the lack of real-time insights and transparency into the asset management process hindered its ability to make informed decisions. Additionally, regular failures and disruptions, as well as synchronization issues with supplier assets and third-party products, impacted worker morale and overall efficiency.

鈥淲e lacked real-time insights and transparency into the asset management process and value chain to make informed decisions based on real-time data,” explained Bruno Vidal, business applications consultant at Petrobras. “We were looking for a best-in-class platform that could provide a central view of our mission-critical assets, allowing our assets and data to work in harmony.”

Manage the entire lifecycle of your physical assets with EAM software systems from 麻豆原创

Petrobras needed a solution that could provide real-time insights, reduce downtime, and align with its wider ERP and digital transformation strategy.

Building on Petrobras鈥 Ongoing 麻豆原创 Journey

Petrobras looked to due to its rich 麻豆原创 ecosystem and legacy. Building on its ongoing 麻豆原创 journey, the company saw an opportunity to enhance its 麻豆原创 footprint across the organization and implement other 麻豆原创 innovations.

鈥淲e had an 麻豆原创 legacy, a technological program to implement , and we had a strong operational demand for an asset management solution,” Vidal shared. “Together, this created a powerful business case for 麻豆原创-powered intelligent asset management solutions and tied in with our 麻豆原创鈥揻irst approach.鈥

From Proof of Concept to Successful Pilot Implementation and Beyond

In 2020, Petrobras conducted a proof of concept to evaluate the feasibility and potential of 麻豆原创 Intelligent Asset Management. The successful execution of the solution led to the selection of the for a pilot implementation project. The BUZIOS field is the world鈥檚 largest ultra-deepwater reservoir, representing almost 16 percent of oil and gas production for Petrobras.

鈥淕iven the size of the BUZIOS field, even a small return of value has the potential to generate a huge return for the company with reduced downtime and increased efficiency,鈥 said Vidal.

Thus, the project initially focused on a limited scope, including 麻豆原创 Asset Strategy and Performance Management for reliability assessments and 麻豆原创 Predictive Asset Insights for equipment monitoring and failure predictions. The pilot implementation project started with one unit and expanded to include all units and critical systems. such as gas compression, oil and gas production gathering, fire and gas detection, firefighting, and energy generation. These systems involved a significant amount of maintenance and reliability data.

Leveraging Machine Learning to Detect Errors and Predict Failure

In addition to the pilot implementation, Petrobras activated the machine learning engine in the 麻豆原创 solutions as a pilot project for anomaly detection and failure prediction.

Deliver the perfect customer experience with zero down time and and optimal asset performance

鈥淲e had great results from the machine learning features, which allowed us to uncover further insight and make performance improvements,鈥 Vidal recounted.

Thanks to the success, the solutions were later launched to five more critical systems of the oilfield, including offloading, oil, water and gas treatment, and water pumping for injection. By the end of 2023, Petrobras had moved from proof of concept through going live with 10 critical systems in all units from BUZIOS field, including uncovering machine learning benefits, as well as concluding the proof of concept for the same solutions in Petrobras鈥 downstream operations.

Business Benefits that Create High Value to Petrobras

As the company achieved significant operational benefits at the BUZIOS oilfield, it plans to roll out to other upstream locations, introducing solutions beyond reliability engineering. With a significant return on investment, Petrobras plans to evaluate the value returned by the new technological solution and expand its usage across its teams and other locations in the future.

鈥淭he implementation of 麻豆原创 Intelligent Asset Management has led to an improvement of our operational efficiency and increased availability of our machines,” Vidal concluded. “When we reduce failures, accurately monitor our equipment, get real-time performance data, reduce production losses, and implement a reliability culture, we reduce oil losses, inspire greater confidence in our people, and return huge value to our organization.鈥


Karin Fent is senior director of global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain.

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courtesy of Petrobras

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Jowat Creates Seamless, Just-in-Time Operations with 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing /2024/01/jowat-creates-seamless-operations-sap-digital-manufacturing/ Wed, 17 Jan 2024 13:15:00 +0000 /?p=221554 is one of the world鈥檚 top adhesive manufacturers for industrial use. Tradition and experience from 100 years of corporate development and experience allow it to act as a leading company in technology and innovation in numerous markets and application areas.

Jowat SE鈥檚 annual production amounts to 100,000 tons of industrial adhesives. Production is complex and requires high volumes of specialized chemicals and a tremendous amount of power. With raw materials and energy costs skyrocketing, premium manufacturer Jowat looked to get a tighter grip on its inventory management and production processes.聽聽

To ensure maximum efficiency, Jowat requires enough raw materials to fulfill orders while minimizing waste and inventory costs. Moreover, the company needs smooth workflows, as any delay in order placement, production, or the delivery of raw materials can have huge cost implications for the company.聽As a result, Jowat works hard to ensure that its 24/7 manufacturing processes always run like clockwork.

With demand for industrial adhesives surging, the company was eager to ensure that its production processes could scale to meet increasing order numbers and still deliver optimum efficiency.

Deliver individualized, sustainable, and smart equipment, products, and components in industrial manufacturing

Targeting Seamless Digital Workflows

Originally established in 1919, Jowat is no stranger to innovation. Leaders at Jowat identified that the next stage of the company鈥檚 evolution would require a radical digital transformation of its production and inventory management processes. 

鈥淥ur factory workers relied heavily on paper-based processes,鈥 explained Dirk-Alexander Segger, Detmold plant manager at Jowat. 鈥淔or instance, when employees had finished mixing and decanting adhesives, they handwrote notes to track the volume and type of raw materials that they used during the process. Shortly after decanting, workers would then input the information from their notes into our inventory management and manufacturing execution systems, adding to their workload and increasing the risk of errors.鈥 

Tracking materials usage manually created time delays, potential for human errors, and discrepancies between the stock numbers recorded in Jowat鈥檚 inventory system and the actual volume of raw materials available on the factory floor. Moreover, with information stored across multiple systems and in different formats, plant managers had no clarity to identify process bottlenecks or potential enhancements.聽聽

Annette Podleschny-Borchardt, project lead at Jowat, commented: 鈥淭o enhance efficiency, improve transparency, and prepare for growth, we decided it was time to go entirely paperless. Building digital processes would give us a more detailed, up-to-date picture of our stock position, which would help drive smarter raw materials purchasing decisions and production improvements.鈥澛

鈥淲e aimed to take a more proactive approach to our manufacturing processes. Developing robust, reliable, end-to-end digital workflows was the perfect way to achieve this goal,鈥 explained Christine K眉nne, head of IT and Business Process Services at Jowat SE. 

Embracing Digital Transformation

To find the best solution to support its digital transformation initiative, Jowat invited multiple technology vendors to outline the strengths of their solutions. To keep customization low, Jowat targeted a solution that it could easily adapt to meet the highly specialized nature of just-in-time chemicals manufacturing.  

After reviewing 15 different solutions, Jowat selected . In addition to providing a solid foundation for digitalization, 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing can also integrate seamlessly with Jowat鈥檚 existing 麻豆原创 solutions, including , , and (麻豆原创 BTP). 

Sustainable, risk-resilient manufacturing is here

“We were immediately interested in 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing because it is a cloud-native solution,鈥 commented Segger. 鈥淧reviously, we used on-premise solutions that required us to carry out extensive and disruptive updates. With 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing, we get instant access to the latest features thanks to the quarterly release schedule.鈥 

Jowat also valued 麻豆原创鈥檚 proactive engagement with the chemicals manufacturing industry. 鈥淲e really appreciate that 麻豆原创 is eager to co-innovate with industry leaders like Jowat to develop next-generation manufacturing solutions,鈥 said Podleschny-Borchardt. 鈥淭hrough the 麻豆原创 Customer Engagement Initiative, we can help expert developers at 麻豆原创 build smart factory solutions that meet the needs of our sector down to the finest detail.鈥 

Sticking with the Experts 

To ensure a smooth implementation of 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing, Jowat relied on support from 麻豆原创 Services and Support.

鈥淲henever we hit a stumbling block, the experts helped us work through the issues. For instance, we wanted to develop a dedicated production operation dashboard, which would give plant managers fast access to key production metrics. As this was uncharted territory, it naturally took a lot of time and energy to work through and 麻豆原创 was behind us every step of the way,鈥 said Segger.

Currently, Jowat is completing the first phase of the 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing implementation at its Detmold factory before expanding the solution across all plants. K眉nne explained: 鈥淲ith a phased implementation, we can ensure that the processes we build at our Detmold plant are tried and tested to deliver maximum efficiency. This will give us the best chance of success when we roll out these processes across all our facilities.鈥 

鈥淐onsultants from 麻豆原创 Services and Support brought not only their expertise to the project, but also the willingness to listen to the needs and the challenges of our industry. Because of this, we were able to collaborate extremely effectively,鈥 added Podleschny-Borchardt.

Driving Efficient Manufacturing with High-Quality Data 

With 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing, Jowat left error-prone, manual processes behind and now benefits from seamless digital workflows with end-to-end transparency. This helps increase quality and ease work for shop floor operators. The activity confirmation is automatically done in the 麻豆原创 system, enabling real-time inventory insight. 

Consequently, Jowat gained the following benefits:

  • 100% digitalized manufacturing process
  • One source of truth for detailed production information
  • Time savings of three person days per week through automated raw material consumption updates allowing employees focus on higher value activities
  • 100% accurate inventory

鈥淭oday workers feed consumption information at the point of production. Previously, it would take one full-time employee three days a week to track raw materials consumption,鈥 said Segger. 鈥淲ith 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing, we have a real-time, accurate picture of our raw materials usage and needs. This is helping us optimize usage and reduce costs.鈥 

Podleschny-Borchardt added: 鈥淧roduction processes are so much faster now that we have built streamlined digital processes. Before, our paper-based ways of working could add up to five days to production timelines. With 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing, we鈥檝e shaved off this time, allowing us to produce and distribute products to our customers much faster, boosting satisfaction.鈥 

Planning Ahead for an AI-Driven Future 

With reliable, up-to-date information in 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing, plant managers and leaders at Jowat can have full visibility across the entire manufacturing cycle. 鈥溌槎乖 Digital Manufacturing has helped improve the traceability of our products and given us a much more detailed understanding of our manufacturing operations. Ultimately, that helps to enhance planning and provides new insights into potential process improvements,鈥 said K眉nne.  

Jowat鈥檚 plans for 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing go far beyond a global rollout. The company is already exploring the potential to scale and streamline manufacturing processes further with artificial intelligence (AI) and Internet of Things (IoT) technologies. 

鈥淎I holds tremendous potential for us,鈥 reflected Podleschny-Borchardt. 鈥淲e鈥檙e excited to explore how it can help us to ensure consistently excellent quality across heavily customized product lines and how we can enhance production uptime with IoT-driven predictive maintenance. Having an AI-ready solution like 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing at the heart of our operations makes taking these next steps in our innovation journey much easier.鈥 

Summarizing the overall benefits, K眉nne concluded: 鈥淲ith the implementation of 麻豆原创 Digital Manufacturing through 麻豆原创 Services and Support, we see ourselves on the way to becoming a transparent factory with a reduction in risks, errors, and process costs thanks to optimized processes.鈥 

, including improved quality with AI-assisted visual inspection. Be sure to listen to the about how a renowned manufacturer revolutionizes manufacturing with Industry 4.0. Also, read this from Oxford Economics about making supply chains more resilient and sustainable.


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success for Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

Top image courtesy of Jowat.

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Putzmeister Digitalized Global Field Service Management Processes to Increase Efficiency and Customer Satisfaction /2023/12/putzmeister-digitalized-global-field-service-management/ Wed, 27 Dec 2023 13:15:00 +0000 /?p=220799 Innovation is not the first thing that springs to mind when you think of the concrete industry. But innovation and concrete go hand in hand at , a Germany-based global market leader of concrete pumps, machines, and vehicles that the construction industry requires to process and distribute concrete and mortar. For instance, in 2021 Putzmeister introduced the first emission-free, truck-mounted concrete pump, the iONTRON Hybrid, as a worldwide novelty.

Besides innovation, excellent customer service is a top priority for the company that employs more than 3,000 people and maintains a partner network in 90 countries.

Due to constant business growth, existing customer service processes became insufficient and the company knew it needed to introduce a state-of-the-art solution that would support harmonizing field service management processes from a local and regional level to a global rollout.聽聽聽

鈥淲e worked with 麻豆原创 at various service locations in Germany, but service processes were heterogeneous and involved paperwork and manual feeds into the system. Although we captured a lot of data, the processes didn鈥檛 allow us to effectively leverage them and they often got stuck in PDF documents,鈥 Bernhard Urban, head of Customer Service Germany at Putzmeister Concrete Pumps GmbH, said.

As a consequence, Putzmeister set out the following goals:

  • Improve and streamline high-end customer service globally.
  • Replace manual processes with modern, optimized, digitalized processes for field service management.
  • Digitalize deployment planning of service technicians.

Introducing a Global Standard for Services Processes

To stay ahead of competition, Putzmeister decided to introduce a global standard for its service processes and select an innovative and digital solution to support planners, dispatchers, and service technicians with the following main objectives:

  • More efficient resource scheduling
  • Optimization of field technician assignments 
  • Harmonization, simplification, and digitalization of field service processes, including processing complex service reports with master data from 麻豆原创 ERP
  • Employee leveraging of inspection protocols
  • Integration with mobile devices allowing field technicians to report time, material consumption, and expenses
  • Sped up and digitalized shop-floor processes

The company found that best suited its needs. The cloud-based solution helps digitalize field service and optimize operations while working to reduce environmental impact through efficient service delivery.

For the implementation of 麻豆原创 Field Service Management, Putzmeister turned to , an NTT Data company. 鈥淭he Sybit team has comprehensive experience in the area and provided valuable recommendations and guidance, especially in early project stages,鈥 Urban said. That enabled Putzmeister to go live with a pilot in less than eight months and involved business process re-engineering and optimization. The cooperation with Sybit was very fruitful thanks to an agile project management approach, intelligent key user training, and field tests.

Increase efficiency, reduce costs, and improve satisfaction with 麻豆原创 Field Service Management

Establishing a New End-to-End Service Process

Service requests from customers are now entered into 麻豆原创 ERP by the back-office team and automatically transferred into 麻豆原创 Field Service Management for resource scheduling. Service technicians then receive a notification on their mobile device to confirm the order. At the same time, they get insight into inventory and can request the spare parts and materials they need.

When it comes to order execution, technicians can have all the information at their fingertips, including various inspection checklists related to service categories and images. They can do material availability checks from inventory, confirm used and no longer used components, and request additional supplies. The service report is then created on their mobile device and submitted to the customer for confirmation. Moreover, the solution allows service technicians to include additional details to create the invoice, such as actual time recording, unplanned activities, automatically calculated daily allowances, and other costs related to the on-site service.

The benefits Putzmeister achieved are:

  • One harmonized, digitalized, and integrated service process for service locations in Germany and the global industrial technology team
  • Optimized customer service thanks to instantly available information, such as machine data, operating hours, error quotes, and faster invoicing after order fulfillment
  • A single source of truth for all information that helps increase service quality
  • Transparent, digitally available, real-time service reports
  • Increased productivity and time savings for planners, dispatchers, and technicians
  • High user acceptance from service staff due to a modern user interface (UI), mobile access, and better insights to execute work orders

Preparing for an International Rollout

After the successful pilot implementation in Germany and first international rollout in Spain, Putzmeister wants to take the next step and roll out to its global operations.   

鈥淭he digitalization of field service management brings countless benefits, both for our customers and our employees, and helps us gain more efficiency,鈥 Urban concluded.


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

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Zamora Company Is Helping Create a Better World by Reducing Packaging with 麻豆原创 Responsible Design and Production /2023/12/zamora-company-reducing-packaging-sap-responsible-design-and-production/ Thu, 21 Dec 2023 12:15:00 +0000 /?p=221022 As a consumer you may not have heard of , but it will surely ring a bell when you hear the names of some of its most popular premium spirit and wine brands, such as Licor 43, Martin Miller鈥檚 Gin, Yellow Rose, Ram贸n Bilbao, Champagne Pommery, and many others.

The international enterprise with headquarters in Spain and operations in more than 80 countries has been including environmental protection and economic growth into its DNA and is constantly working on achieving a sustainable business model that will be its future legacy to society and to the planet. Its commitment to the planet is based on four pillars: climate action, biodiversity protection, circularity, and conscious suppliers.

The mission of Zamora Company toward its suppliers is to encourage them to be more sustainable by collaborating closely to substitute product and packaging materials with more sustainable alternatives and to use more recyclable packaging materials to support circular economy principles. It鈥檚 no wonder that, for Zamora, sustainability goes hand in hand with innovation without compromising the highest quality standards. as a conscious company is also focused and aligned with the achievement of the set by the United Nations 2030 agenda.

Accelerating Innovation Through New Packaging Legislation

Since the introduction of a in Spain on January 1, 2023 on non-reusable plastic packaging, companies are required to meet comprehensive reporting requirements.

The tax is an indirect excise tax with an environmental purpose. It aims to internalize the environmental costs related to the manufacturing and consumption of plastic packaging in the price of final products.

The taxable event is the manufacturing, import, or intra-community acquisition of non-reusable plastic packaging for its use within the Spanish market. The plastic packaging tax captures a broad concept of “non-reusable plastic packaging” in its scope, which includes:

  • Non-reusable plastic containers 鈥 the law provides definitions of 鈥渘on-reusable,鈥 鈥減lastic,鈥 and 鈥渃ontainer鈥 for the purpose of this tax
  • Semi-finished plastic products, such as preforms and thermoplastic sheets, intended for production of non-reusable plastic containers
  • Plastic products aimed to facilitate the closing, trading, or presentation of non-reusable containers

鈥淭he new legislation required us to respond to governmental requisitions and was an additional driver to accelerate our sustainability efforts,鈥 Enrique Gonzalo Mec谩ndez, 麻豆原创 manager in Operations at Zamora Company, explained. 鈥淲ith a cross-departmental team, we were looking to find the most appropriate and scalable software solution to meet the country鈥檚 regulatory requirements and help us with data management, a tax monitor, and reporting and insights.鈥

Keeping All Data in One Central Place

As a result, Zamora Company found that , an industry cloud-based solution, would best meet its needs. 麻豆原创 Responsible Design and Production can support manufacturers and retailers in calculating extended producer responsibility (EPR) obligations and fees, plastic taxes, and corporate commitments to optimize material choices. In addition, it helps improve design decisions based on costs and planetary impact.聽

Start acting on a circular economy and eliminate waste with 麻豆原创

鈥淔rom a process standpoint, 麻豆原创 Responsible Design and Production facilitates the incorporation of everything related to sustainability data linked to the material, so that all relevant information is unified in the material master,鈥 Gonzalo Mec谩ndez said. 鈥淎s all information is kept in one place, purchasing work and master data maintenance required to ensure regulatory compliance is centralized, without the need to manually replicate information in different systems.鈥

鈥淢oreover, leveraging a single and integrated platform with provides the security of working with up-to-date and correct data. Additionally, the data quality application allows our users to detect any lack of information and correct it,鈥 he added. 鈥淲ith deep knowledge and solution experience, our trusted partner , an company, closely supported us during the implementation of 麻豆原创 Responsible Design and Production, as well as the integration with our 麻豆原创 S/4HANA platform.鈥

The benefits Zamora Company achieved include:

  • Ability to rely on 100% correct data, fully aligned with material registration processes
  • Cost savings thanks to less administrative work, eased reporting, and a central data repository
  • Reduced risk of non-compliance with extended producer responsibility regulations in Spain
  • A simple, user-friendly tool to support legal reporting requirements in a timely manner
  • Ability to expand solution usage to meet upcoming EPR legislation in other countries, like Italy 

Positive Impact on Customers, Economy, Society, and Environment

鈥淭he project helped us learn more about our products and incorporate their packaging details, so that our company knows exactly how much plastic and non-recycled plastic is being used. In a more strategic phase, this will allow us to evaluate alternative materials and compositions, which can create cost savings for the company and positively contribute to the environment by being able to transition to more sustainable elements,鈥 Gonzalo Mec谩ndez concluded.

Watch a solution to learn how to start acting on a circular economy, design products sustainably, and eliminate waste with 麻豆原创 Responsible Design and Production. about what benefits other enterprises achieved.

To explore how the comprehensive, cloud-based sustainability solution portfolio from 麻豆原创 can support carbon footprint management, reducing material waste, and becoming a socially responsible business, visit .


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success, Digital Supply Chain, at 麻豆原创.

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Jowat Doubles Productivity with Smarter Maintenance and Strategic Insight into Asset Management /2023/12/jowat-smarter-maintenance-strategic-insight-asset-management/ Wed, 06 Dec 2023 12:15:00 +0000 /?p=214302 Manufacturing adhesives is a complex process and ensuring production line machines are well-maintained, safe, clean, and calibrated is a constant challenge.

That’s why Jowat looked to empower its technicians to prioritize work more effectively, manage inventory and costs more efficiently, and make smarter strategic decisions about asset investments.

Avoiding Sticky Situations with Effective Maintenance

The production line sits at the heart of any manufacturing company. If production misses a beat, the whole business feels the impact. And if a breakdown takes production offline, the consequences can be both operationally and financially disastrous. That鈥檚 why , one of the world鈥檚 leading suppliers of industrial adhesives, takes plant maintenance very seriously. As a key supplier to the furniture, packaging, textiles, automotive, and electrical industries, any delay in delivering its products could cause significant disruption and potentially cost the company and its clients millions of Euros. So, it鈥檚 vital that all production line equipment is always properly maintained.

Natanael Hernandez, 麻豆原创 manager at , explained: 鈥淎dhesive manufacturing is particularly challenging because of the nature of the product. Our machines need regular and thorough cleaning to avoid contamination between batches. Hot glue can be hazardous to work with, so safety is critical. And to meet our environmental goals, we aim to recycle as much of the water and oil we use as possible, which adds to complexity and cost of labor.鈥

Find out how you can drive intelligent asset management

To keep operations running smoothly, Jowat鈥檚 maintenance teams need to do more than just corrective break/fix maintenance. Regular inspections and preventive maintenance are key for technicians and supervisors. Moreover, many of the company鈥檚 production line machines rely on expensive components that take months to manufacture, so inventory management is vital to ensure that technicians always have the parts they need. And in the bigger picture, Jowat also wants insight from maintenance processes to feed into strategic decision-making. 鈥淲e realized that if we could gain more insight into the total cost of maintaining each of our production line machines, we could make better decisions,鈥 said Hernandez. 鈥淔or example, does it make financial sense to keep this line running, or should we replace it with something more efficient?鈥

It was clear that with a deeper understanding of its maintenance and inventory processes, the company could streamline the management of its plants and make smarter investment decisions. That鈥檚 where 麻豆原创 came in.

Digitalization Transforms Asset Management

Until a few years ago, Jowat relied on a legacy application to manage maintenance tasks. The system was not integrated with the company鈥檚 core 麻豆原创 applications, so technicians and supervisors had to manage their daily tasks manually. 鈥淭he paperwork made it impossible to track time and labor costs, and it was difficult to establish an audit trail,鈥 said Hernandez. 鈥淪o, we decided to introduce the 麻豆原创 Enterprise Asset Management solution (麻豆原创 EAM) to digitalize and standardize our maintenance processes.鈥

Integrated with Jowat鈥檚 core software for inventory, purchasing, sales, and cost accounting, 麻豆原创 EAM introduced a more formal process around the creation of maintenance work orders. The solution also provided an inventory management system that enabled Jowat to manage its stock of spare parts. 鈥淔or the first time, we had an accurate view of our inventory, as well as the cost and lead time for ordering replacements,鈥 said Hernandez. 鈥淭his makes it easier for us to maintain appropriate reserves and gives visibility to other companies within the Jowat group. So, if a plant in Germany needs a part that we have in stock in the U.S., they can see it and buy it from us straight away instead of waiting months for the manufacturer to ship it to them.鈥

麻豆原创 EAM was a big step forward for the maintenance team, but its user interface was designed for power users sitting at full-sized screens, not mechanics and electricians working on the factory floor. 鈥淲e needed something simpler and more streamlined that our technicians could use on their mobile devices,鈥 explained Hernandez. 鈥淎t the same time, we wanted to be able to track the work they were doing more accurately.鈥

Maintain sustainable, risk-resilient operations with 麻豆原创 Service and Asset Manager

Jowat discovered the , which is part of the 麻豆原创鈥檚 industry cloud. 鈥溌槎乖 Service and Asset Manager was exactly what we were looking for. We loved the simplicity and it was a great fit for our business processes. As soon as our technicians saw the new application, they wanted to work with it. Now, our technicians and supervisors have an intuitive mobile app that gives them the visibility and control they need to maintain our production line equipment more efficiently,鈥 he added.

Working with , an experienced 麻豆原创 partner, Jowat launched the new mobile app at its U.S. plant and planned a global rollout for its manufacturing sites in Germany, Malaysia, and China. So far, 21 technicians are using the app on their iPad Mini devices, while seven supervisors can choose between using the app on their iPhone or logging into the main 麻豆原创 EAM interface. To help ensure smooth adoption of the solution, Jowat is also working with the team.

Doubling Productivity with an Intuitive Mobile Solution

With , Jowat鈥檚 technicians can see all corrective and preventive maintenance work orders assigned to them immediately, so they can organize their work more effectively. For example, if they are assigned several tasks on the same machine or in the same area of the plant, they can do them all at once instead of spending time going back and forth. For supervisors, the app helps make it easier to understand the status of open work orders and prioritize more efficiently. They can move more urgent tasks forward or put less important ones on hold and, crucially, they can document the reasons for their decisions. If a work order can鈥檛 progress until a replacement part has been delivered, it鈥檚 immediately clear why the job is on hold.

Since the launch of the 麻豆原创 solutions for asset management, Jowat has seen a reduction in total downtime on its production lines. Moreover, productivity has effectively doubled. Before the implementation, around 45% of work orders in the system were actively worked on by technicians. Today, that figure has risen to around 85%-90%. At the same time, the maintenance backlog has been reduced by 75%, from three months to around three weeks. 鈥淎 three-week backlog is probably optimal for our business, because there will always be a proportion of tasks that have to wait for a viable maintenance window,鈥 explained Hernandez. 鈥淭he key thing is that the backlog doesn鈥檛 increase 鈥 once we got it down to three weeks, it has never crept back up again.鈥

The app can also provide new capabilities for reviewing and approving completed work orders. Technicians can use their mobile device to take pictures of the before and after state of the assets they are working on to document the repairs they have made. And if during a maintenance visit a technician notices a problem that hasn鈥檛 been reported yet, they can take a photo or video and send it directly into 麻豆原创 EAM to generate a new work order. Inventory management is simpler, too. Whenever stock of a required component falls below a minimum threshold, the system can automatically trigger a purchase requisition to order replacements. 鈥淏efore, we didn鈥檛 know what we were spending on spare parts,鈥 added Hernandez. 鈥淣ow, we can allocate costs to specific lines and even specific machines. With full visibility of the cost of parts and labor, we can make much more informed decisions on whether to continue maintaining an asset or replace it with a newer, more efficient machine.鈥

Expanding Functionality in the Future

In the future, Jowat hopes to build on the success of this project by expanding its use of  to introduce calibration capabilities. The company is also evaluating introducing the , as well as taking advantage of the predictive material and resource planning functionality in .

鈥淎t the moment, our focus is on maintenance, but we know there is so much more we can do,鈥 concluded Hernandez. 鈥淲e鈥檙e excited to work with 麻豆原创 and great partners like AG to explore the possibilities.鈥


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success, Digital Supply Chain, at 麻豆原创.

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How PILLER Increased Customer Service with 麻豆原创 Customer Experience Solutions /2023/08/piller-increased-customer-service-sap-cx/ Thu, 24 Aug 2023 12:15:50 +0000 /?p=206556 produces high-performance blowers and compressors and customized solutions to meet specific requirements of various industries. Its global network of wholly owned subsidiaries and joint ventures enables it to serve an international customer base.

To increase customer service quality, the company wanted to share information and optimize business processes across its sales, service, and marketing activities.

Moving from Manual Processes to Integrated Activities

At PILLER, different departments were using their own IT solutions.

麻豆原创 Customer Experience solutions help connect customer data, improve loyalty, and grow your business

The service department had manual processes, such as Microsoft Excel spreadsheets, to dispatch service technicians. The technicians were logging into a central server to retrieve data and recording customer support by e-mails and conversations. The sales department had a basic access environment due to custom-made products with individual serial numbers. There was no master data; tailored sales quotes were done on paper, posing challenges for data updating and quality. The marketing department was conducting its business, like capturing trade-fair leads or planning and executing campaigns, by hand and with spreadsheets. All these manual activities were time intensive and prone to human error.

To enable the marketing, sales, and service teams to perform to the best of their abilities, PILLER wanted solutions that allowed it to share important information. It wished to harmonize all customer-related processes, from initial contact and order management to delivery of spare parts and follow-up.

鈥淔or new products or customers, it鈥檚 important that real-time master data in our core software is mirrored in our sales, service, and marketing systems. We can do this by integrating 麻豆原创 Customer Experience solutions and 麻豆原创 Field Service Management with 麻豆原创 S/4HANA,鈥 said Frank M眉nzner, in-house 麻豆原创 consultant for Lead to Cash at PILLER Blowers & Compressors GmbH.

Adopting Cloud Solutions to Achieve Innovative Customer Service

PILLER employed the solution to help address the needs of its sales team and integrate functionalities, such as managing quotes and orders, in one place. The solution offers a search capability and a modern, intuitive user interface.

The company is using the to help create service tickets, which are the single point of customer contact, with product serial numbers and metadata. Integrating this mobile app with the solution can enable technicians to receive service ticket information on an Apple iPad, so they can have everything they need to carry out their work. This can also translate to good customer support.

By deploying the solution and integrating it with 麻豆原创 Sales Cloud, PILLER now proactively shares data, such as service tickets, lead opportunities, and customer contacts, between the sales and marketing teams. This lets the company contact a customer with a warranty option or service cost reduction, for example.

PILLER has now integrated the three 麻豆原创 Customer Experience solutions for sales, service, and marketing and with , the company鈥檚 enterprise resource planning (ERP) software.

PILLER partnered with to gain advice about new functionalities and implementation support, while provided guidance around leveraging the potential in terms of business transformation and digitization.

Gaining Comprehensive Customer Visibility with Integrated Solutions

Resolve customer issues faster with proactive, AI-enabled field service management software from 麻豆原创

The major advantage in connecting the 麻豆原创 Customer Experience portfolio, 麻豆原创 Field Service Management, and 麻豆原创 S/4HANA is that real-time data can be available across all these solutions. While master data, such as for a new product, customer, or material, is entered and kept in 麻豆原创 S/4HANA as the core software, it鈥檚 automatically pushed into the other integrated solutions.

This is helping PILLER deliver highly efficient and innovative customer service and business models. The company gains a comprehensive view of worldwide customers in real time while interacting with them at each stage of their journey in a targeted manner.

There are now customer-related processes across departments, sites, and systems as well as consistent communication throughout the company, thanks to standardized forms and templates. The business is achieving agile sales with faster response times and better allocation of target groups. It鈥檚 also making decisions for customer management based on facts and analyses.

Other benefits the company achieved were:

  • 360-degree view of customers worldwide in real time
  • 90% less paper with digital processes
  • 30% reduction in effort by using digital processes

鈥淲e鈥檝e always combined tradition with innovation when manufacturing our blowers. With 麻豆原创 Customer Experience solutions, our customer management operations are superior to those of our competitors. We鈥檙e able to keep a close eye on processes and respond quickly and accordingly,鈥 said Thomas Henzler, CIO at PILLER Blowers & Compressors GmbH.

Rolling Out Customer-Centric Solutions

Combining and the 麻豆原创 Field Service Management mobile app with 麻豆原创 S/4HANA is helping deliver real-time data for integrated processes.

The integration of the 麻豆原创 Field Service Management mobile app with 麻豆原创 Service Cloud is being piloted with three service technicians and garnering positive feedback so far.

Watch an of 麻豆原创 Sales Cloud to help build lasting customer relationships and to maximize customer lifetime value with connected service. Read about the benefits companies achieved with . View a  and  to learn how to maximize productivity and asset uptime with 麻豆原创 Field Service Management. .


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

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Roche Connects Asset Data to Contextualize and Improve Every Decision /2023/08/roche-asset-data-contextualize-improve-decisions/ Mon, 07 Aug 2023 11:15:59 +0000 /?p=206277 In a recent webinar, Iago Accioli, project manager of Assets at Roche, discussed how the pharmaceutical company has been improving its asset management and maintenance processes from a broader supply chain perspective.

is one of the world鈥檚 largest biotech companies, a leading provider of in-vitro diagnostics and a global supplier of transformative, innovative solutions across major disease areas.

Cost as a Main Driver for Asset-Intensive Organizations

鈥淎s a pharmaceutical company, Roche was founded more than 100 years ago in Basel, Switzerland, with both pharma and diagnostics divisions. We are in the middle of an journey with the goal to harmonize business processes on all sites and divisions around the world,鈥 said Accioli.

To manage assets under volatile conditions effectively, just like other asset-intensive organizations, Roche focuses on reducing maintenance cost and increasing asset reliability, which are key to its customers and patients.

The challenge is 鈥渢he handover from original manufacturer to engineering to maintenance and how to interact with each other,鈥 explained Accioli. 鈥淲e resolve this with these business process harmonization initiatives.鈥

Risk Resilience as an Investment for the Future

麻豆原创 suggests three strategies to help companies manage their business holistically, including cost, speed, profit, customer service, and risk:

  • Connecting supply chains to the entire business so that information insight flows go quickly from operations to manufacturing, design, and into the business to respond to disruptions
  • Contextualizing information during the work process to equip users with technology to get real-time insights and make decisions during the business process to increase impact
  • Collaborating externally with suppliers, asset operators, OEMs, and logistics providers to ensure that information is flowing beyond the internal network to set up a risk-resilient business while mitigating risk

Closing the Loop Between Strategy and Execution

Managing costs and increasing equipment reliability is a major factor and closing the loop between asset strategy and maintenance execution, such as to make assets more reliable and connected to maintenance execution considering different asset type, is a big opportunity.

鈥淔ive to 10 years ago, reliability engineering became a shining topic at Roche, and we discussed where to start, how much we spend on maintenance, what our most important assets were, and where we should spend more energy and money. We standardized processes to classify our equipment into different asset criticalities 鈥 high, medium, and low – and, based on each category, we established a maintenance strategy,鈥 explained Accioli.

鈥淎fterwards, we looked for a tool that would best suit Roche given the amount of data. Now we have an asset and maintenance strategy in place that is reflected in our system. In 2019, we started harmonizing our processes and were pleased that 麻豆原创 solutions could support us,鈥 he continued.

In particular, Roche looked to:

  • , which helps with performing criticality evaluations directly in the 麻豆原创 system instead of spreadsheets. With criticality results reflected in the system, the maintenance strategy can result in preventive maintenance plans. 鈥淩oche is in the middle of the journey. No sites are live yet,鈥 said Accioli. Roche is also enabling access to its service providers to get design insights and improve collaboration.
  • , which enables maintenance plans and work orders to be accessible to maintenance technicians so that they can make instant material reservations and get access to maintenance manuals on mobile devices.

鈥淚 expect a significant decrease of maintenance execution as we can plan our work better thanks to a mobile-supported solution,鈥 said Accioli. 鈥淭he experience with the solution is quite good.鈥

Roche was already using 麻豆原创 at different sites with its own work order types and data model, but it was not automated and connected.

鈥淲e also intend to migrate to , a successor cloud-based application, where Roche鈥檚 enhancement ideas have been incorporated,鈥 explained the manager.

Connected Asset Data Helps Contextualize Business Decisions

For contextualizing every business process through the eyes of maintenance, it is necessary to converge enterprise IT data with equipment and sensor data to run analyses based on algorithms and machine learning technology. Accioli explained: 鈥淏eing able to schedule maintenance activities is a substantial improvement for maintenance organizations. To monitor both targets and results, we are using , which has many good capabilities. We are developing maintenance KPIs with the insights we get from聽 artificial intelligence (AI) and rolling these back into the asset strategy and reliability process. These are particularly good tools.鈥

Effective Collaboration Across the Ecosystem to Build a Collaborative Supply Chain

鈥淔or Roche, sharing information and effective collaboration with asset providers and across our ecosystem is particularly important. Vendors and different equipment suppliers must exchange and collaborate on asset data. Operators and service providers should be able to use the network but also manage the work order process,” said Accioli.

To summarize, the key benefits of 麻豆原创 Asset Strategy and Performance Management and 麻豆原创 Service and Asset Manager Accioli sees are:

麻豆原创 Asset Strategy and Performance Management:

  • Defining which maintenance strategy applies to which classification of equipment
  • Maintaining assessments in the system
  • Generating criticality based on assessments
  • Reflecting reliability-centered maintenance in the system, including decision trees and supportive templates

麻豆原创 Service and Asset Manager:

  • Being a digitized, automated, paperless solution
  • Being able to work offline
  • Having all maintenance data at hand in one place

Listen to the webinar recording . In addition, watch this to learn how to maximize asset health and performance with 麻豆原创 Intelligent Asset Management solutions and read what . To know more about the role of service and asset management in your industry, .


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.
Top photo credit: Roche

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Patterson Dental Improves Customer Experience with Streamlined Field Service Management /2023/07/patterson-dental-field-service-management/ Wed, 05 Jul 2023 12:15:53 +0000 /?p=205696 Patterson Dental, a division of , headquartered in St. Paul, Minnesota, provides dentists across the United States with a large range of products, from toothbrushes and gloves to digital imaging and operating room equipment, to ensure patients get optimal care.

Its workforce is 7,500 strong, of which more than 800 are field service technicians who are responsible for supporting thousands of customers. The company was challenged by inefficient, manual processes for daily route planning to execute repair and warranty activities at customer sites, as well as a cumbersome coordination process for customer appointments and time slots for repair.

Empowering Technicians in the Field to Deliver Additional Value

Patterson knew it could empower employees to provide better customer service related to on-site visits for equipment repairs and realize significant savings at the same time. To achieve this, Patterson needed new insight to better coordinate these visits and help technicians spend less time on visits and on the road.

Integrated Field Service Management Helps Save Time and Cut Costs

The business case the company built was to:

  • Increase revenue per technician (billed hours/day)
  • Optimize routing and reduce mileage
  • Cut costs for coordinators by more efficient scheduling
  • Increase customer experience by improved interaction and scheduling

In 2021, Patterson began to use , a cloud-based solution that helps support the company鈥檚 goal to streamline field service management processes with an integrated solution while easing life for technicians, dispatchers, and coordinators as well as, most importantly, improving customer satisfaction. 麻豆原创 Services and Support was at Patterson鈥檚 side to help implement and integrate the solution with its existing IT landscape.

鈥淓very part of the field service process has improved with 麻豆原创 Field Service Management. Coordinators can connect with our customers quickly, and technicians now show up for customers鈥 appointments faster and better informed,鈥 said Larry Fox, senior director of Technical Service at Patterson Dental.

New Solution Provides Millions of Dollars in Value Every Year

The 麻豆原创 Field Service Management solution helps provide key data for scheduling field service appointments with customers and completing repairs more efficiently. In particular:

  • Two to five minutes per job are saved related to the effort required to schedule and manage field service requests per coordinator.
  • Thirteen minutes of unbilled travel time is saved per billed hour, freeing up time for Patterson to serve more customers.
  • Forty metric tons of carbon emissions are saved per year due to more sustainable routing, 5% less miles traveled per day, and reduced fuel usage.

Thanks to an add-on tool, the company can also leverage real-time and historic data, such as traffic jams, to optimize routing and save time for technicians.

Overall, Patterson was able to cut costs due to improved coordination of customer appointments; increase customer satisfaction thanks to streamlined processes; increase revenue thanks to improved efficiency for technicians, leading to more billable hours; and gain greater insight into the fuel use, travel time, and other costs related to field service.

Watch a and to learn how to maximize productivity and asset uptime with 麻豆原创 Field Service Management. what benefits other enterprises achieved.


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

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Lenovo Banks on 麻豆原创 Digital Supply Chain Solutions /2023/03/lenovo-banks-on-sap-digital-supply-chain-solutions/ Mon, 20 Mar 2023 11:15:20 +0000 /?p=203687 In an age where change is a constant and innovation an imperative, 麻豆原创 solutions run among the most mission-critical systems around the globe while enabling businesses to leverage the innovation they need to achieve their purpose.

At 麻豆原创 Sapphire Virtual in 2022, Lenovo joined a conversation with Chief Marketing and Solutions Officer and Member of the Executive Board of 麻豆原创 SE Julia White on 鈥淩ealizing the Power of Becoming an Intelligent, Sustainable Enterprise.鈥

With regard to the investments 麻豆原创 makes in the area of digital supply chain, Yang Yuanqing, chairman and CEO of , said, 鈥淚鈥檓 very happy to see the continuous enhancements for our supply chain solutions. Lenovo delivers over 150 million products a year, which means we deliver about five products every second to our customers around the world with an on-time delivery rate of 96%. 麻豆原创 is key in this effort with its world-class supply chain solutions.鈥

鈥淭ogether with 麻豆原创, Lenovo is building new, state-of-the-art smart factories globally. These new smart factories are running on Lenovo infrastructure with end-to-end, order-to-delivery solutions connecting over 2,000 suppliers to billions of customers,鈥 said Yuanquing. 鈥淭hat will definitely take Lenovo manufacturing to a whole new level.鈥

Scaling Operations and Investments to Meet Growing Customer Demand

Arthur Hu, senior vice president and CIO at Lenovo and CTO of at Lenovo Group Ltd., remarked, 鈥淚t鈥檚 critical to have the latest technology. Digital helps us achieve the efficiency and accuracy at scale and smart technology helps us take the latest operating models and incorporate artificial intelligence (AI) into our operations. has been helping us power that journey and is one of our cornerstone investments in the modern, digital, and smart core.鈥

Sustainability Is Moving to the Forefront

Lenovo is seeing sustainability move to the forefront in communications with its customers across all levels and geographies. 鈥淭his matches perfectly with Lenovo鈥檚 services-led transformation that we are driving,鈥 said Hu. 鈥淟et鈥檚 take, for example, device as a service 鈥 . We are able to design sustainability into each step of the offering. We can think about how to deploy efficiently, maximize utilization during the asset lifecycle, and use recovery services for secure and responsible handling at the end of the useful device life.鈥

鈥淏y reimaging our services with sustainability in mind, we are able to do right for our customers and meet our sustainability goals. The right technology and services means being able to say yes to more things and the right things,鈥 he concluded.

Transitioning from a Hardware Company to a Full-Service Technology Solutions Provider

In terms of transformation, Hu said: 鈥淎t Lenovo, we know transformation because we are starting it and doing it ourselves. We call it 鈥楲enovo powers Lenovo.鈥 We have revamped our entire company with a new services-led business model supported by modern digital infrastructure.”

鈥溌槎乖 has been on a long journey with us. Beyond smart factories and , we are using cloud services from 麻豆原创 to great effect,鈥 he added. 鈥淲e鈥檝e got in the cloud to gain visibility into our procurement spend and we are using to manage employee expenses and provide a better experience. On the frontlines of our transformation is , which is our umbrella for offering everything on our portfolio as a service. That鈥檚 been a key trend.”

鈥淭o make it work, we needed the ability to engage our customers differently than in the traditional hardware sale, building by period, by service, by item,鈥 said Hu. 鈥淎nd here we are using on powered by . This allows us to rapidly bring new business offerings to the market in a scalable way.鈥

鈥淲e are working to identify innovation opportunities with 麻豆原创. We are taking what we are doing together on transformation, figuring out what other companies may require, and turning that into code and functionality as 麻豆原创 solution components. This makes the entire community and ecosystem more valuable,” said Hu. “All this comes together to make an excellent case where we are using the combined power of our technologies to advance our transformation at speed and lead the way with new, compelling value propositions for our customers.鈥

Learn more about how to achieve resilient, connected, and sustainable supply chain management processes from design to operate or from 麻豆原创 Sapphire Virtual in 2022.


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

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Plant-Based Food Company Upfield Maximizes Supply Chain Transparency /2022/11/upfield-maximizes-supply-chain-transparency/ Wed, 09 Nov 2022 11:15:43 +0000 /?p=200762 Have you ever heard of global food company ? Maybe not, but you probably have at least one of its famous brands of margarine, food spreads, and plant-based foods on your breakfast table. As the world鈥檚 largest plant-based consumer packaged goods company, Upfield operates in 95 countries with a workforce of 4,200 employees.

The company was founded in 2018 as a spin-off from聽Unilever and its mission is to deliver plant products for healthier lives and happier people for a better planet.

鈥淯pfield is a quite new company that operates in a very dynamic market environment sensitive to social integrators and economic indicators,鈥 said Anand Mathew, platform lead, Supply Chain Applications at Upfield. 鈥淚n terms of planning and logistics, key objectives are to ensure a high service level. Moreover, we aim to reduce product cost while ensuring minimal obsolescence as customer demands are ever changing.鈥

Upfield set specific targets along its supply chain. 鈥淔or example, as plant-based is part of our formulations and product development, we must be sure to move towards a 100% natural formulation. Not meeting this goal in particular markets can impact us with negative publicity around packaging or product quality. Also, recent disruptions due to COVID-19 and the war in Ukraine 鈥 the biggest producer for sunflower oil, which is a key product ingredient 鈥 forced us to change and update formulations very quickly and pass that information on to manufacturing, transportation, and our customers,鈥 Mathew explained.

鈥淥ther requirements related to sustainability are to be plastic free for our packages or disclose our methane footprint, including the CO2 product footprint. All this deeply implicated our IT systems and how we run our supply chain. It must be reflected in our product development, manufacturing, and distribution, and ultimately be reported,鈥 the executive added.

The Need for Integrated Solutions along the Supply Chain

The IT solutions portfolio taken over from Unilever didn鈥檛 meet Upfield鈥檚 needs to align objectives along the entire supply chain and had to be updated to ensure the highest level of integration.

鈥淭o achieve our product strategy goals, we have been fostering integration of disparate systems with as the backbone. This integration allowed us to be where we are now,鈥 Mathew said. 鈥淔or instance, we manage around 4,000 specifications for ingredients and up to 2,500 recipes with 麻豆原创 Product Lifecycle Management.鈥

For supply chain planning, Upfield is using for demand, response, supply, and sales and operations planning (S&OP). Mathew explained: 鈥淭wo hundred of our business users use 麻豆原创 Integrated Business Planning in 95 countries. The regions have slight variations in managing the solution, but all countries are using demand planning so that we get our S&OP numbers entirely through 麻豆原创 Integrated Business Planning.鈥

The executive added: 鈥淲e are looking to use machine learning-based statistical forecasting via capabilities that the latest 麻豆原创 Integrated Business Planning version provides. Then we can build Python scripts into our end-to-end planning process. For the future, 麻豆原创 Sustainability Control Tower will be another important 麻豆原创 Integrated Business Planning component in our strategy as it enables exception-based planning, and we also evaluated demand-driven materials resource planning (DDMRP).鈥

鈥淪ourcing is done via 麻豆原创 Ariba solutions to identify appropriate suppliers, also for plastic-free materials. New targets are constantly impacting which suppliers to work with or what criteria to meet when working with a new supplier,鈥 he said. 鈥淲ithin the 麻豆原创 Ariba solutions, we use sourcing, supplier selection and supply selection criteria, and contract management, completing contracts via DocuSign before handing off to 麻豆原创 S/4HANA or the supply chain for execution. We use it for direct procurement for our products and indirect procurement,鈥 Mathew remarked.

For its logistics processes, Upfield is leveraging 麻豆原创 Transportation Management and . Ocean movements are managed via 麻豆原创 Transportation Management and land movements with both.

鈥淲e use for calculating transportation movements, planning shipments, and route optimization. Resulting freight orders are passed on to the carrier. Settlements are then done within 麻豆原创 Business Network for Logistics. There, our carriers can either log directly into the carrier tenant to accept or reject preorder or use the booking functionality to specify preorder execution,鈥 Mathew explained. 鈥淭he network supports fixing settlements after freight order execution. Overall, 麻豆原创 Business Network for Logistics provides better communication with our carriers.鈥

Achieving Higher Agility and Resilience

Upfield is also tracking the life cycle of each product until its retirement. 鈥淎t each stage, every system has to be aligned to avoid the risk of obsolescence, and we have been able to reduce cost with help from 麻豆原创 solutions,鈥 Mathew said. 鈥溌槎乖 S/4HANA and supply chain solutions helped us be more agile. The main advantage is the integrated planning capability we have across our supply chain. Thanks to native integration or interfaces we built across different tools, we are able to react much faster to any kind of disruption. It鈥檚 all about agility.鈥

With 麻豆原创鈥檚 synchronized planning approach, production schedules can be updated quickly, helping to ensure the right ingredients are in place at the right time.

Future Plans to Foster Even More Integration

End consumers benefit from Upfield鈥檚 ambitions enabled by this holistic approach with higher quality plant-based products as well as unified messaging and branding.

鈥淥ur vision is to have end-to-end integrated planning, from supply chain planning to execution, including finance. We chose 麻豆原创 because of the completeness of its vision,鈥 Mathew concluded.

Discover how planning can be the cornerstone of a sustainable supply chain and make sure you check out the planning and sourcing report, 鈥.鈥


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success for Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

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De鈥橪onghi Places the Customer at the Heart of Its Digital Supply Chain /2022/04/delonghi-digital-supply-chain/ Tue, 19 Apr 2022 11:15:25 +0000 /?p=195925 The is among the leading global players in the small appliance sector dedicated to the world of coffee, cooking, air-conditioning, and home care. The group distributes its products in more than 120 markets worldwide. Its community of more than 10,000 employees contributes annually to the launch of increasingly innovative products in line with consumer needs. In 2021, the Group achieved 鈧3.2 billion in revenue.

De鈥橪onghi鈥檚 鈥淐ustomer Fulfillment Excellence鈥 project continues its innovation journey with the adoption of the solution, aiming to rethink and transform the company鈥檚 supply chain and refocus the entire value chain by placing the customer at the heart of it. The project will review processes and tools used by the group鈥檚 global supply chain in order to improve service levels.

More specifically, De鈥橪onghi鈥檚 goals involve complying with on-time delivery, anticipating customer demands through more precise forecasts by turning sales forecasts into more accurate production plans, making production more reliable by properly assessing production constraints, and having more accurate component procurement plans.

This transformation process has also been made necessary by the De鈥橪onghi market environment, which has changed dramatically in recent years and is driven by greater omnichannel development, increased volatility of demand, and a greater emphasis on e-commerce, both directly and through brick-and-mortar customers and e-retailers.

In addition, the group鈥檚 increasingly international soul and a major expansion in foreign markets have brought with it increasing complexity in value chain management accentuated by recent macroeconomic events, which, together with increased online sales, has created certain challenges in sourcing raw materials and organizing logistics and transportation. This complicated and highly volatile environment has led the company to review all processes and tools at its disposal.

麻豆原创 IBP is the solution that will allow us to take a step forward, particularly by implementing an integrated, end-to-end supply chain with metrics and easy-to-read reporting to operate in a more agile way, and to make decisions with distributed, transparent information that allows us to react to market volatility,鈥 reports Matteo Pecci, global supply chain director at De鈥橪onghi. 鈥淪uch a solution is capable of combining the dual soul of De鈥橪onghi, a very strong company in terms of product with a highly entrenched industrial culture that needs to be close to the end market, have know-how to interpret the dynamics, and swiftly respond to changes at the same time. A solution like 麻豆原创 IBP will enable us to do this and with the integration of existing 麻豆原创 systems, data will flow in a more harmonious and transparent way.鈥

A Global Project Towards a Digital Value Chain

At De鈥橪onghi, will help cover all demand planning and supply planning needs, working to create a supply chain that does not work in silos but starts with the customer, horizontally, avoiding typical slowdowns associated with the departments that are typically involved in their management. The international project will involve all of the group鈥檚 customers and suppliers with a view of a digital value chain and collaborative forecasting.

De鈥橪onghi has business locations in 32 markets and across five continents, with highly detailed value chain processes and a high number of product codes for managing a supply chain that serves the company鈥檚 global operations.

鈥淲ith the implementation of 麻豆原创 IBP, we expect to anticipate market changes and developments ahead of time and to extend them along our supply chain consistently and quickly to make the right decisions within our departments. For example, if we receive customer orders and there are no products in stock, instead of detecting it when it is too late for shipping, this “early signal” will give us the ability to react in time,鈥 concludes Pecci.

Through automation and artificial intelligence (AI) within the solution, De鈥橪onghi can also free up its employees from repetitive, transactional procedures and assign more value-added tasks. Collaborative tools help to better manage communication and correctly assign tasks, avoiding tools that can slow down processes and lead to a loss of information.

The Path to 麻豆原创 IBP

The implementation project consists of two phases. The first involves the introduction of demand and supply planning processes and the second phase involves production scheduling and optimizing sales order management, all of which integrates with the capabilities of , with a positive impact on group logistics management as well.

Three hundred people at De鈥橪onghi will use 麻豆原创鈥檚 supply chain planning solution, a choice made by the company after a selection process of several months and careful functional, technical, and economic assessment.

鈥溌槎乖 Integrated Business Planning enables a more agile way of working, allowing companies to better predict and manage risks and opportunities and anticipate them to identify more profitable and sustainable solutions,鈥 says David Vallejo, vice president, global head, Digital Business Planning, 麻豆原创. 鈥淪o, it鈥檚 important to prepare for uncertainty by simulating critical situations in order to understand how to act quickly and from a what-if perspective, always with the aim of improving business and supply chain planning and synchronizing decisions between finance, manufacturing, and logistics.鈥

To learn more on how to maintain business continuity in times of supply chain disruption with 麻豆原创 Integrated Business Planning, get a or an overview video.


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

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Safeguarding Employee Welfare at Motor Oil with Real-Time Incident Reporting /2022/02/motor-oil-safeguarding-employee-welfare/ Wed, 09 Feb 2022 13:15:50 +0000 /?p=194487 Motor Oil, Corinth Refineries S.A. is an energy group based in Greece. It was founded in 1970 and its refinery in the region of Corinth counts among the top refineries in Europe.

The company plays a leading role in crude oil refining and marketing of petroleum products in the country as well as the greater Eastern Mediterranean region, supplying its customers with a wide range of high-quality products. Motor Oil produces 185,000 barrels of crude oil each day with a workforce of 2,500 employees and exports to more than 45 countries. The refinery, along with its ancillary plants and fuel distribution facilities, constitutes the largest privately-owned industrial complex in Greece.

Recently, Dimitrios Michalopoulos, head of Industrial Applications at Motor Oil, explained how the company improved environmental, health, and safety processes. This is of significant importance to the company鈥檚 success in keeping incidents at a minimum and ensuring a safe work environment for its employees.

Replacing Manual Incident Management Processes

For many years, incident management processes were cumbersome and manual. 鈥淲e have three categories of incidents: incidents where someone was hurt like through a fire, near misses, and safety observations,鈥 Michalopoulos said. 鈥淚n the past, the incident management process was based on spreadsheets. In the case of an incident, refinery engineers had to fill a predefined form and e-mail it to our health and safety department. As there were no predefined field values, employees were free to enter texts without getting any system-based assistance and control.鈥 He continued: 鈥淎s a result, it was very difficult to generate any relevant KPIs as the entire process was manual.鈥

The assignment of incident managers was carried out by the health and safety section head without adequate traceability on what happened when and who was actually acting as the responsible incident manager.

鈥淭he investigation and root cause analysis process was executed completely offline, and corrective or preventive actions that were decided to be executed resulted from the investigation process. All of that was recorded in shared spreadsheet files and progress was communicated via e-mail,鈥 he added. 鈥淚t is obvious that the monitoring of corrective or preventive actions was a cumbersome and time-consuming task for all incident managers. The preparation of KPIs and reports based on unstructured data was a challenging and manual process with a high risk of human error.鈥

The company had to take a new approach to overcome the challenges. 鈥淎ll the above challenges related to an insufficient quality of incident management. The amount of time required for managing this on a daily basis, including preparing KPIs and reports, led us to the decision of deploying a new and integrated solution based on 麻豆原创 ERP,鈥 Michalopoulos explained.

Project Objectives and Key Factors

In terms of objectives and key factors, Michalopoulos identified increasing employee participation in and awareness of health and safety processes as one of the key objectives for the project. 鈥淲e wanted to introduce an intuitive way to make incident reporting easier for everyone in the refinery,鈥 he said.

Additionally, standardizing incident management processes was another important objective for the company. Based on the refinery鈥檚 official procedures, it was important to Motor Oil that every employee should be able to report an incident or a safety observation. To raise employee awareness, the company also set up a rewards program.

Meeting Strategic Goals with a Modern Solution

Motor Oil evaluated 麻豆原创 Environment, Health, and Safety Management and determined that the 麻豆原创 EHS Management, incident management application best covered its requirements. 鈥淲e can rely on it,鈥 Michalopoulos said, adding 鈥渙ur IT infrastructure is based on 麻豆原创. Therefore, we wanted to benefit from leveraging integrated data from other 麻豆原创 solutions and be able to prepare consolidated reports without developing complex interfaces.鈥

Motor Oil deployed the incident management capabilities with its health and safety section as the business owner. 鈥淎ll 1,500 refinery employees can now use the system and the interactive forms can be filled by everyone,鈥 Michalopoulos remarked. Moreover, the solution is used by the incident managers in the health and safety section as well as by refinery section and refinery department heads, which comprise about 50 people.

Improved and Automated Reporting

鈥淲e deployed the new system in July 2021 with assistance from Real Consulting IT Business Solutions S.A. Therefore, it has been productive for only a few months and it is still early to determine safe metrics about the benefits,鈥 Michalopoulos said. 鈥淥verall, the quality of our health and safety processes and the time required for managing incidents have significantly improved.鈥 So far, Motor Oil has seen:

  • Increased employee awareness and higher compliance with internal and external safety regulations and standards
  • Standardized and eased incident reporting on a tablet for all 1,500 refinery employees and the management team
  • Time savings of 25%-30% in managing incidents and reporting, thanks to automated workflows, predefined KPIs, and interactive forms allowing them to focus on higher value-add tasks
  • Availability of up-to-date online reports with the latest incident information details, enabling fast decision-making and advanced analytics
  • Simplified and documented incident investigation and root cause analysis processes automatically trigger corrective and preventive actions that can be monitored and tracked with regard to progress
  • Cost savings thanks to the integration with the company’s human resources system, which runs on 麻豆原创 solutions, to immediately access refinery employee details

New Solution Supports Corporate Goals

麻豆原创 EHS Management helps Motor Oil meet its corporate goals. 鈥淭he nature of Motor Oil Group鈥檚 business operations, such as refining, storage, transportation, and marketing of petrochemical products, make occupational health and safety a matter of high importance and a top priority to us. Our management鈥檚 commitment to ensure a safe working environment is absolute and permanent. We take an ongoing and systematic approach for the improvement of health and safety issues,鈥 Michalopoulos said. 鈥淏ased on this strategy, 麻豆原创 EHS Management plays a vital role to us.鈥

The company鈥檚 future plans include implementing additional software components. 鈥淥ur greenfield implementation is in progress and considered the digital core of the transformation process at our company. In addition, was selected as our strategic tool for planning and budgeting processes at group level.鈥

Request a to learn how to respond and recover while ensuring the safety of employees and customers in times of change with integrated environmental, health, and safety management. Read a on how empowering employees with intelligent systems and data can help them manage unforeseen events in near real time and make more informed decisions.


Karin Fent is senior director of global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

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How Dutch Car Manufacturer VDL Nedcar Digitalized Yard Operations to Boost Efficiency /2021/12/vdl-nedcar-digitalized-yard-operations-to-boost-efficiency/ Thu, 16 Dec 2021 12:15:47 +0000 /?p=193184 鈥淲ith a growing number of customers and increasingly complex supply chain processes, VDL needed to replace its legacy system with a modern and flexible IT landscape to support our clear Industry 4.0 vision to drive efficiencies and be ready for the future.鈥

These were the words of Pepijn Timmermans, vice president of Digitalization at VDL Nedcar,聽who I recently had the chance to speak to about how the company modernized and digitalized its yard operations.

What Is VDL Nedcar?

is not just the only independent contract manufacturer in the Netherlands but also one of the most advanced vehicle manufacturers in Europe. The 50-year-old company builds high-quality cars for major brands such as BMW, as well as a plug-in hybrid electric vehicle (PHEV) variant of the MINI Countryman. And as a company that banks on strong partnerships and innovation, VDL will also build electric vehicles for their newest customer, the U.S. company Canoo.

How to Manage a Yard Full of Moving Products

VDL Nedcar faced the challenge of managing the movement of vehicles, parts, and materials. 鈥淲e have 1,000 parts suppliers, 12,000 parts numbers, and seven carriers who bring all these parts by truck to our plant, which results in an inbound of 270 full trucks per day coming in and going out,鈥 Timmermans explained.

鈥淭he automotive industry has a closed loop where packaging material is brought back to the supplier. This means transport can arrive at any moment and within only one hour the driver drops a trailer, picks up another with packaging materials, and leaves the yard,鈥 he added. 鈥淲e have to manage 350 trailers in our yard. Basically, it鈥檚 a warehouse management system for trailers.鈥

The process to do this was very manual. When a carrier came in, they picked an empty spot in the yard, filled out papers, and took them to the office where the information was put into the system. This was a very labor-intensive and error-prone process, and, as Timmermans explained, 鈥淚f we missed only one trailer, the impact could be dramatic and costly.鈥 A missed trailer of a vital part could harm the production processes and even lead to major stoppages of the plant for a full day, which relies on a just-in-time approach.

The Answer? Warehouses on Wheels

The answer was to analyze business processes. 鈥淲e have a very unique inbound logistics supply chain concept. I think we are the only one of the OEMs in Europe who has control of inbound transport fully in our own hands,鈥 Timmermans said. 鈥淚n our material requirement system, we also integrate the whole of inbound logistics transport planning as part of the , which makes us unique and enables us to have very efficient inbound logistics.鈥

鈥淲e established a 鈥榳arehouse on wheels鈥 concept, which optimizes our transport efficiency,鈥 he said. 鈥淚nstead of booking a time slot days ahead with the risk of long waiting times at the gate and manual management of documents in the past, carriers can arrive at our plant 24/7, sign in at the gate, get a parking location assigned for the trailer, and receive a note where to pick up an empty trailer with packaging materials.鈥

Managing the Logistics of the Yard

To get full control and transparency of this warehouse on wheels, VDL Nedcar implemented .

鈥淏ased on聽听补苍诲听, we developed a solution where our six dock master trucks that drive the trailers from the yard to the loading dock and empty back to the yard can be steered fully automatically,鈥 Timmermans explained. 鈥淭he trucks are equipped with industrial flat screens and connected to the solution. All movement triggers are visualized for the dock masters and they get automated priorities for which trailer to transport where, including an optimization algorithm to indicate which truck is close to the trailer to be picked up. Getting this process automated and optimized saved one employee per shift.鈥

鈥淧reviously, we also did a manual weekly inventory of all trailers on the yard for which we needed one man day per week. That has all gone,鈥 he added.

鈥溌槎乖 Yard Logistics helps us cooperate with our suppliers much better. We have an easier, digitalized, and transparent process at the gate for our carriers, which boosts efficiency, reduces waiting time, and eases administration,鈥 he said.

Tangible benefits听颈苍肠濒耻诲别:

  • Increased process transparency
  • Reduced administrative effort of one day per week
  • Time savings thanks to inventory automation
  • Efficiency gains due to automated and digitalized processes on the yard saving one employee per shift
  • Reduced waiting time for carriers and enabling them to plan better
  • Streamlined and transparent processes at the gate
  • Almost no incidents or administrative mistakes
  • Standard solution that is integrated with聽

鈥淚n the future, we plan to connect our yard logistics processes with聽 to provide a self-service portal for the carriers, automate gate processes with cameras, and leverage聽聽to get full transparency across the entire supply chain,鈥 Timmermans concluded.

To learn more about how to achieve efficient and sustainable processes with 麻豆原创 Yard Logistics, .


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

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How a European Utilities Company Makes Maintenance More Efficient, Transparent, and Cost-Effective /2021/12/european-utilities-company-retipiu-makes-maintenance-efficient-transparent-cost-effective/ Fri, 10 Dec 2021 11:15:26 +0000 /?p=193134 The Italian natural gas and electricity provider RetiPi霉 S.r.l. is in charge of 2,900 kilometers of gas and electricity networks that serve homes, businesses, and public spaces in 25 towns across the northern Italian province of Monza and Brianza.

Managing Ever Complex Asset Networks at Minimum Cost

As these networks grow and become more complex, RetiPi霉 must ensure safety and reliability through daily maintenance performed by its field workers. It is also crucial for them to quickly identify critical network events and efficiently prioritize, schedule, and track field-service assignments and maintenance activities.

But disparate asset management systems made it hard to prioritize and schedule maintenance calls. In addition, they were not integrated with the company鈥檚 core enterprise resource planning (ERP) system.

Moving from Reactive to Predictive Maintenance

To increase efficiency and optimize resources, RetiPi霉 looked to move from a reactive to a predictive maintenance model. The goal was to understand critical events as early as possible, track and trace issues from alert to resolution, get better visibility into maintenance schedules and work-order status, and use that information to better manage maintenance across the network.

To meet these goals, RetiPi霉 required a unified intelligent asset maintenance system that workers could access from the field and that was integrated with its intelligent ERP software.

One Central Asset Intelligence System to Speed up Maintenance Cycles and Lower Costs

As its utilities networks continue to grow, RetiPi霉 S.r.l. deployed to help improve data quality and access for engineers and back-office teams. Building on that digital transformation, it then added the 麻豆原创 Enterprise Asset Management solution to help configure digital twins for equipment and activate predictive models respectively. These algorithms help assess and prioritize maintenance requirements and optimize resources. The company leverages the solution to gather detailed sensor data from across the network assets to share information via mobile applications with field technicians, who get information and update the status of work orders in real time.

Increasing Productivity and Improving Customer Service with Smarter Asset Maintenance

The system currently supports thousands of pieces of equipment. In addition to making maintenance simpler and more efficient, asset and maintenance data 鈥 including cost data 鈥 are immediately available for analysis in . As a public utility, the real beneficiaries are RetiPi霉 customers that now have faster activation service. And in addition, RetiPi霉 benefits by being rewarded by the Italian government for its continually reliable service.

The most striking benefits the utilities company gained are:

  • 100% increase in assets that can be managed on the network – from 12,000 to 24,000 pieces of equipment
  • 50% reduction in maintenance cost
  • 15%-20% less time needed to activate new gas customers
  • Increased efficiency and resource optimization
  • Improved prioritization of field-service assignments and maintenance tasks
  • Improved field operations effectiveness through mobile system access to maintenance staff
  • One single platform to manage data and analytics for all assets 鈥 creating a fully integrated and transparent maintenance process from order to the field and back

Real-Time Data Transfer from Technician Mobile Apps to Back-End ERP Systems

鈥淚n choosing an intelligent, predictive maintenance solution, integration with our core ERP systems was key. With 听补苍诲 , we have one unified system that provides everyone the visibility they need to work efficiently and effectively,鈥 says Massimo De Filippi, director of Technical and Information Services and Design at RetiPi霉 S.r.l.

He continues: 鈥淭his project has allowed RetiPi霉 to ensure service continuity and avoid shutdowns. We can provide quality service while also reducing costs. We are a public company, so the ultimate benefit is for the citizens.鈥

鈥淏y being able to access data and reports in real time, field engineers can intervene promptly whenever issues arise, improving the customer experience and strengthening our reputation as a trusted energy provider,鈥 says Mario Carlo Borgotti, managing director of RetiPi霉.

In regard to future plans and after being live with the gas network, RetiPi霉 now has a template for rolling out intelligent asset management and predictive maintenance to its electricity and public lighting networks. As the next step, it will enable simulation of maintenance requirements for new assets that have yet to be added and include geolocation services for route optimization.

To learn more about how to enable intelligent asset management processes, , “The Building Blocks of Industry 4.0 with Intelligent Assets.”


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

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Leading Commercial Vehicles Manufacturer Embraces Industry 4.0 to Achieve Smarter and Leaner Operations /2021/11/leading-commercial-vehicles-manufacturer-vecv-embraces-industry-4-0/ Fri, 26 Nov 2021 13:15:16 +0000 /?p=192213 Headquartered in Gurugram, a city located about 30 kilometers southwest of India’s national capital New Delhi, VE Commercial Vehicles Ltd. is regarded as the most successful joint venture in the Indian commercial vehicle industry.

In 2008, two leading players in the commercial vehicle business 鈥 Volvo Group and Eicher Motors 鈥 joined forces with a common vision of driving modernization in the commercial transport business in India. Volvo Group brought in global expertise, leadership in product technology, well-defined processes, and a brand respected all over the world. Eicher Motors, a leader in the light and medium vehicle segment, contributed with frugal engineering, considerable after-sales infrastructure, and cost-effective operations.

VE Commercial Vehicles Ltd. (VECV) is comprised of six business verticals: Eicher Trucks and Buses, Volvo Trucks India, Eicher Engineering Components, VE Powertrain, VECV Engine Business, and Volvo Bus India. The company includes the exclusive distribution of Volvo Trucks in India, engine manufacturing and exports for Volvo Group, non-automotive engines, and the Eicher component business. A multi-brand, multi-division company backed by innovative products and services, VECV is recognized as a leader its industry today.

Mastering Highly Complex Assembly Processes at Minimum Cost

Commercial truck manufacturing involves highly complex assembly operations due to the large number of variants, the thousands of parts being assembled, and the many types of tools and machines that are required.

On top of this, VECV faced several challenges:

  • Shortage of skilled manpower that made it extremely difficult to maintain quality and high productivity at minimum cost
  • Inability to track and trace its assembly operations
  • Considerable training effort was required for new operators as there was no system to guide operators on assembly processes while performing operations
  • Suboptimal line efficiency, machine utilization, and operator productivity resulted in lower quality and higher rework due to lack of process controls and error-proofing
  • Lack of data connection on the assembly line which did not allow any meaningful insights to improve process quality

Paving the Way to Industry 4.0 and Smart Manufacturing

VECV needed a solution that would enable real-time monitoring of its entire manufacturing supply chain processes to:

  • Gain meaningful insights to increase overall line efficiency, productivity, and quality
  • Achieve cost savings by standardizing operational processes and equipment
  • Create standard operating procedures to guide new operators and reduce time for operator deployment on assembly lines
  • Reduce operator errors and drive efficiency by making assembly operations 100% traceable
  • Decrease costly downtime by implementing predictive maintenance for critical machinery

Embracing Industry 4.0 principles, the vehicles company decided to adopt smart manufacturing processes by implementing Industrial Internet of Things (IIoT)-based solutions from 麻豆原创 to bring shop-floor visibility to the top floor. This enables faster decision-making and provides meaningful insights to improve overall line efficiency, productivity, and quality.

Fostering Smarter and Leaner Operations with Impressive Results

VECV introduced , which is comprised of a number of digital manufacturing solutions that helped meet its objectives. The solution was deployed on all 10 assembly lines, each comprised of about 150 assembly stations, where over 200 machines are used to assemble about 3,000 parts.

This means that:

  • Assembly operations鈥 standard operating procedures are now displayed in real time. Assembly machines are connected to capture more than 400 critical process parameters, ensuring tight process controls and error-proofing.
  • Automated part selection guarantees correct selection and traceability for all 3,000 parts. The RFID integration through 麻豆原创 Plant Connectivity eliminates manual interventions and screens on assembly stations optimize efficiency.
  • A defect capturing and feedback system improves product quality and reduces errors.
  • A 100% labor tracking improves operator efficiency.
  • Overall equipment efficiency calculations enable predictive maintenance of critical machines. Real-time reports provide meaningful insights and enable faster decision-making. Vibration sensors installed on six key critical machines capture data into 聽via 麻豆原创 Plant Connectivity software. Data is analyzed to create an algorithm in 麻豆原创 MII to predict machine failure.

麻豆原创 Manufacturing Suite enabled the company to standardize operational processes, equipment, and activities, leading to cost savings in operations and faster gains in productivity and quality. With 100% tracking and traceability of all assembly operations, troubleshooting time was significantly reduced. Tight process controls and error-proofing increased overall product quality, reduced mistakes, and improved productivity.

As Sumit Goyal, senior manager IT, Digital Manufacturing, explained, 鈥溌槎乖 Manufacturing Suite has brought many tactical and strategic benefits to VECV. It has helped improve productivity, lower operating costs, and increase quality and compliance. By gaining real-time visibility into the entire manufacturing supply chain, we are able to accelerate root-cause analysis by making fact-based decisions.鈥

And the numbers speak for themselves. VECV has seen:

  • 15% productivity improvement
  • 30% process quality improvement
  • Reduction in field failures
  • 20% improvement in manpower utilization
  • Significant reduction in non-value-add activities through automation
  • 40% error reduction
  • 100% tracking and traceability of critical process parameters and assembled parts
  • Zero compliance issues

And from an IT perspective, VECV now has:

  • A single platform capturing data from different sources to ease system maintenance
  • Reduced infrastructure and operational costs by removing standalone, third-party solutions used to capture data from different systems
  • 95% of machines connected with line controls and improved process quality by 20%
  • 30% reduction in unplanned downtime
  • 15% improvement in OEE (overall equipment effectiveness) management and OLE (overhead line equipment)

Want to learn more about how innovative organizations utilize Industry 4.0 to improve manufacturing processes? Check out the 鈥溾 report and read the .


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

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Taking Customer Service to the Next Level with a Digital Asset Network /2021/10/taking-customer-service-to-next-level-with-digital-asset-network/ Wed, 20 Oct 2021 11:15:49 +0000 /?p=190093 You may not see BITZER鈥檚 products, but you can feel their effects everywhere, from fresh foods to pleasantly air-conditioned buildings and reliably cooled industrial complexes.

With local roots in Germany and a global presence, the BITZER group is represented in more than 90 countries with 72 locations and over 3,800 employees. The company has been providing innovative products and services for 87 years. Its products maintain the optimum temperature in buses, trains, and buildings as well as ensure foods stays fresh at all times on their way to consumers.

Transforming to Aid Customers and Gain Competitive Edge

I recently spoke with BITZER’s Eugen Bonelis, digital solution manager, and Christian Stenzel, director of Organization and IT.

Bonelis started by saying, 鈥淭o support BITZER鈥檚 innovation and future growth strategy, the company set an objective to transform from a compressor manufacturer to a provider of compressor-enabled services. With the transformation of our business model, customer service would be taken to the next level.鈥

鈥淭o achieve this goal, we needed a central platform that would allow us to digitally connect our compressors to enable customers to monitor machine status in real time, access configuration data and documentation, and review operational reports,鈥 he continued,

This network provides solutions for remote troubleshooting to keep machines running efficiently while helping BITZER transform its business model, future proof the enterprise for changing market dynamics, and keep its competitive edge.

Asset Network Manages Compressor Performance and Digitizes Enterprises

By integrating a suite of 麻豆原创 solutions to digitally connect its refrigeration technology, BITZER is helping its customers optimize operations and tap into new digital solutions.

For example, -enabled compressors and solutions provide situational awareness of the real-time operation in the new digital network. This facilitates tailored customer alerts based on sensor readings, status reports, and data analytics services, helping to provide an overview of the customer’s ecosystem in a service-oriented interface.

鈥淲e can now connect applications, processes, and people through 麻豆原创 solutions to distribute information and deploy operation analytics,鈥 Stenzel explained. 鈥淏y monitoring operational data remotely in real time and using advanced data analytics, we can instantly identify operational issues and offer actionable insights, including spare parts preorder capabilities, shortening downtime and supporting customized operational reports.鈥

Developing a Customer-Centric Experience

Bonelis discussed the importance of great customer engagement, saying, 鈥淚t’s important to be close to your customers, be creative, and provide solutions to their needs. With 麻豆原创 Business Technology Platform and 麻豆原创 Asset Intelligence Network, we can provide 360-degree information that enables an outstanding customer focus.鈥

The benefits are clear. Major outcomes BITZER achieved include:

  • Complete, real-time overview of customer product portfolios and product history, from the initial order throughout the entire lifecycle of the compressor with the BITZER Digital Network, which connects all BITZER products to the cloud
  • Increased ability to break down information and departmental silos, operating as a single company focused on customer outcomes while growing the business
  • A basis for BITZER鈥檚 partners to transform their own business models into a service provider for refrigeration
  • Enhanced customer satisfaction, enabling the business to digitize and tap into new product, service, and market opportunities while customers regard BITZER as a valuable partner
  • Increased revenues by providing new services spanning equipment monitoring, operational reports, and instant remote assistance in the event of defects
  • Reduced compressor downtime thanks to data analysis capabilities, leading to a competitive advantage for both BITZER and its customers
  • Increased energy efficiency through optimization of compressor operation by leveraging BITZER鈥檚 know-how

BITZER worked with the 麻豆原创 Services and Support team to create the new asset network and connect its customers鈥 refrigeration and air conditioning products and related operational data in the cloud.

鈥淭he support of 麻豆原创, especially the Customer First program, has been very important for us. We have exchanged many ideas that have led to exciting new initiatives for our company,鈥 remarked Stenzel. 鈥淵ou can鈥檛 buy digitalization, but you can simplify the way toward it. Working with the 麻豆原创 Services and Support team helped us combine 麻豆原创 software, business- and customer-focused know-how, as well as customer-focused innovation to create instant value for our customers.鈥

To learn more about how to enable intelligent asset management processes, the 鈥淚ntelligent Asset Report.鈥


Karin Fent is senior director of Global Customer Success Digital Supply Chain at 麻豆原创.

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How Industry 4.0 Empowers Weidmueller with Real-Time Insights /2020/08/how-industry-4-0-empowers-weidmueller-group-with-real-time-insights/ Thu, 13 Aug 2020 12:15:10 +0000 /?p=177573 Weidmueller is a German company with a longstanding history as a leader in the field of 鈥渋ndustrial connectivity鈥 鈥 the kind of connectivity envisioned by Industry 4.0, where smart factories use data and connectivity to drive new heights of manufacturing efficiency and productivity.

Based in Detmold, Germany, the company prides itself as a 鈥減rogressive thinker and trailblazer鈥 that offers solutions that allow producing companies to prepare themselves for the Industrial Internet of Things (IoT). These solutions enable safe production control from the cloud 鈥 without the need to completely modernize all machines in the factory. This offers customers an affordable approach toward incremental Industry 4.0 adoption 鈥 an approach that many manufacturers are eager to explore.

Early on, Weidmueller recognized the potential of Industry 4.0 capabilities for its own manufacturing processes and decided to take advantage for its own digital transformation initiative and lead by example in the industry it serves.

Click the button below to load the content from YouTube.

Weidmueller: How Industry 4.0 Empowers Employees with Real-Time Insight into Machine Performance

Dr. Patrick-Benjamin Boek heads up the digitalization and factory IT team at Weidmueller. 鈥淲hat we aimed to do is to embed intelligence into the factory floor to eliminate paper, improve transparency, reduce waste, and boost the efficiency of our machines and workforce,鈥 he said.

Weidmueller鈥檚 approach was to integrate 麻豆原创 Digital Supply Chain solutions for digital manufacturing with its existing 麻豆原创 technology landscape. Boek and his team focused on Weidmueller鈥檚 molding department as a pilot. Just four months after launching the project, the company went live.

Weidmueller鈥檚 implementation generates more than 300 data points that give employees on the floor the information they need to optimize production and maximize productivity.

鈥淲e were able to cut downtimes up to 50 percent, as our employees on the shop floor now have accurate insight into machines,鈥 Boek said. This has enabled the company to boost overall machine efficiency 鈥 which has, in turn, helped to increase the value of the company鈥檚 investment in capital equipment.

With its implementation partner Syntax, Boek鈥檚 team also developed native iOS apps that enhance usability on the shop floor by enabling staff to access information in real time on iPods and iPads. 鈥淲e鈥檝e eliminated the time spent walking to each machine to check on status,鈥 Boek shared. 鈥淭his has helped us increase efficiency by up to 20 percent and cut manual effort by up to 60 percent.鈥

Better insight into cycle times and other key performance indicators (KPIs) has helped Weidmueller improve performance, optimize allocation, and make better decisions. And with automated processes that increase transparency into machines and equipment, the company has been able to speed delivery times as well.

鈥淲ith Industry 4.0 and the Internet of Things (IoT) we now have a fully integrated digital manufacturing and process landscape,鈥 said Boek. 鈥淲ith help from 麻豆原创 solutions for digital manufacturing, we鈥檝e been able to maximize the overall efficiency of our machines and improve experiences for our customers.鈥

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