Control of production planning, the availability of useful business intelligence at the click of a mouse, the ability to trace stock and match it against sales and production planning are three of the major benefits that Alrode-based fabric coater and laminator Neucoat is deriving from its investment in SAP Business One software.
The software, supplied and implemented by Lorge, a specialist in branded business and technology solutions, went on line five months ago and while Neucoat is already reaping many benefits from it, some aspects, such as debtor reporting, are being further tailored by Lorge specialists to fulfil other specific needs of the business.
Magix Integration, Lorge`s preferred partner for bespoke software solutions and a specialist in ERM (enterprise risk management) and EI (enterprise integration) products, services and solutions, developed add-on software to meet Neucoat`s specific requirements for business intelligence, stock tracing and the matching of stock against sales and production. Neucoat captures all production information via the Magix application, which is seamlessly integrated into SAP Business One`s production component.
Neucoat produces a variety of waterproof PVC-coated polyester materials in different weights for manufacture into a wide range of products, including marquees, tents, jumping castles, bags, outdoor furniture, lightweight covers, waterproof clothing, medium to heavy duty tarpaulins and transport vehicle side curtains. The company also makes a range of artificial leather in a variety of colours for the furniture, motor manufacturing and motor accessories industries.
"We had a number of software systems which were integrated with great difficulty and useful business information took a long time to extract from it, hence our decision to move to an all-encompassing solution like SAP Business One," said Neucoat marketing director Darrel Dowson.
"It is still early days with the SAP solution and we need more training and enhancements to some areas of the package, which Lorge is implementing for us. But we are already seeing considerable benefits from going this route."
Dowson singles out the centralisation and easy integration of and access to, strategic operational and planning information as being major benefits to the company. "We used to use spreadsheets for reporting on our previous system and because of the lack of integration this was awkward and time-consuming. Now we get accurate, fully integrated information constituting real business intelligence at a mouse click."
At any one time Neucoat holds 10 000 rolls of the PVC coated polyester and mesh products, each with a unique bar code. The materials are high-value and need to be secured with tight controls.
"We have to trace and track these materials throughout the production process and while they are held in stock," said Dowson. The sale of every piece of material from a specific roll, no matter how small the piece may be, has to be matched back to that particular roll for accounting and stock control purposes and this is something that the SAP system is accomplishing for us."
The production side of the SAP solution is creating considerably more information in much greater detail, which Dowson said is critical to the business because its end products go into other manufacturer`s products.
"It may only be material on a roll, but each roll needs a unique identity so that we know what kind of material and how much in lineal metres is on the roll when it goes into stock and thereafter each sale of material is recorded against that specific roll. This allows us to know at any given time what stocks we hold of what materials. This is critical for us to know on a daily basis in order to plan new production and ensure we can confirm customer orders."
The SAP suite implemented by Lorge includes General Ledger, Debtors, Creditors, Invoicing, Credit Notes and Production and Raw Materials. Variables such as Products from Raw Materials are also being accommodated by the system. Dowson says the latter is most important to the company in terms of profit/loss on specific products.
Other stock products used in the manufacturing process that need to be tightly controlled include pigments to obtain different colours, PVC chemicals, plasticizers, backing cloths, embossing papers and various other chemicals. Magix created an add-on that directly integrates into the SAP solution, allowing Neucoat to change the Raw Materials/Bill of Materials formulas.
"SAP Business One is undoubtedly saving us many man hours. We now have a single database instead of having to try to integrate several. Most importantly, we now have much quicker access to information considered critical for the business and that`s where the real value to us lies," said Dowson.
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