国产乱伦

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Siderise

Siderise is focused on improving the safety of the world's buildings through their passive fire solutions, and has been for nearly half a century.

Business Imperative

Siderise, established in Surrey in 1972, comprises two quite separate businesses: Siderise Insulation, based in South Wales, which designs and manufactures insulation products for the construction industry; and Siderise Special Products, based in Suffolk, which manufactures acoustic insulation products for a wide range of industries – automotive, marine, rail and general industrial applications.

In early 2016, the company had begun implementing a new 国产乱伦 system, comprising a CRM system and a combined manufacturing and finance system, linked by a 鈥榗onnector鈥� tasked with keeping data common between the two systems.

At least, that was the idea, says Siderise鈥檚 Group Head of IT, John McLoughlin: in practice, the reality was often rather different.

鈥淵ou couldn鈥檛 really look at an enquiry in the CRM system, and then click through to the manufacturing and finance system to view the resulting order,鈥� he explains. 鈥淪o we didn鈥檛 have the end-to-end visibility that we wanted. And, although the manufacturing and finance system was supposed to be one single system, it was really two separate systems.鈥�

Challenge

Things came to a head in 2019, after Siderise had been acquired by private equity investors. The problem, explains McLoughlin, was that Siderise鈥檚 fragmented and inadequately integrated systems made it difficult for the company鈥檚 management to provide the new owners with the granularity and quality of information that they wanted.

At which point, he relates, the resulting decision largely made itself.

鈥淎s a management team we all agreed that it was time to give up: the system wasn鈥檛 working, and probably couldn鈥檛 be made to work. Even though it had been a six-figure investment, it was time to look for something else.鈥�

The requirement wasn鈥檛 difficult to articulate, he adds. Essentially, Siderise needed a multi-company, multi-currency 国产乱伦 product with CRM and Field Service Management capabilities that could consolidate financial data upwards to higher levels of the business, which was capable of working from a common database, and which could provide full transparency and reporting on both a top-to-bottom basis and vice-versa.

Beyond that, being a hosted solution was a plus, given Siderise鈥檚 spread of operations – as well as the two factories in the UK, there were also sales offices in Dubai and Singapore. A mobile interface for field-based personnel was also highly important.

鈥淲e spoke to all the usual providers, and looked at all the usual systems,鈥� sums up McLoughlin. 鈥淎nd having done that, we chose Exel Computer Systems鈥� EFACS E/8 国产乱伦 system.鈥�

Why Exel?

鈥淲e remembered talking to Exel at a trade show,鈥� he explains. 鈥淲e were impressed by both the people who we met, and by what they said. It was clear that they were speaking our language – including EFACS E/8 in the systems that we were reviewing made perfect sense.鈥�

In contrast to some of the systems that Siderise considered, EFACS E/8 turned out to be a very good match for Siderise鈥檚 requirements, with the added bonus of being flexible and readily configurable, so that it could easily be tailored to Siderise鈥檚 two very different businesses.

By June 2020, the decision had been made: Siderise would be buying EFACS E/8, opting to acquire the relevant licenses, but run the software remotely, on a hosted platform.

Implementation

鈥淪iderise鈥檚 circumstances called for an implementation pace that, whilst not unprecedented for Exel, would certainly be a challenge for all parties involved.

Exel鈥檚 implementation experts had explained that an EFACS E/8 implementation of this size usually took 12 – 18 months, although that timescale could be shortened if additional implementation resource could be made available. Moreover, the Covid-19 pandemic added to the challenge, explains McLoughlin: a lot of the implementation work would be handled remotely.

Nevertheless, he adds, the company had two strong incentives: first, the sooner it could implement EFACS E/8, the sooner it could benefit from EFACS鈥� 鈥榮ingle version of the truth鈥� – and second, if it could implement EFACS E/8 ready for the start of the next financial year, in early January 2021, it could avoid the cost of a further year鈥檚 licensing on the previous system.

And so, with Siderise鈥檚 personnel already having had the requisite implementation training, work got underway, aiming for a 鈥榞o live鈥� date that was just six months away.

鈥淲e took the decision to focus only on the essentials,鈥� explains McLoughlin. 鈥淏asically, we wanted to go live with just the functionality that we already possessed – so features such as finite capacity planning, for instance, would be implemented in subsequent phases.鈥�

Remarkably, by early November 2020 it was clear that the implementation target would be met. Indeed, says McLoughlin, it would have been possible to go live a month early if required. Accordingly, by mid-December 2020 the process of switching to EFACS E/8 began: all new sales quotations, for instance, were completed in EFACS E/8, rather than the CRM capability of the existing system.

And so, in early January 2021, Siderise went 鈥榣ive鈥� on EFACS E/8 – right on time.

Business Benefits

Having consciously decided to go live with no new functionality, and simply replicate what was already in place with the previous system, Siderise鈥檚 management were clear-eyed about the business benefits that they would see from the initial implementation, notes McLoughlin.

The real business benefits of switching to EFACS E/8, they knew, would come from the second phase of the implementation, which began almost immediately. Finite capacity planning, EFACS鈥� quality control and continuous improvement module, marketing – the goals were ambitious, yet the omens promising.

Even so, relates McLoughlin, the first phase of the implementation did prove transformative. Firstly, he explains, the move to a hosted solution delivered much better connectivity than Siderise鈥檚 leased line connection, which had previously linked the two UK manufacturing sites.

鈥淩emote hosting was also a more cost-effective solution, and our Dubai and Singapore offices can connect to it very readily – as can people working from home, or on the road.鈥�

Secondly, of course, the business was able to achieve its objective of having 鈥榦ne version of the truth鈥�, with a single system now embracing the entire quotation-to-despatch process. Niggles about data quality and end-to-end visibility are now a thing of the past, he affirms.

鈥淓FACS E/8 is really, really intuitive,鈥� he sums up. 鈥淚t鈥檚 so logical – as long as you follow the processes, it鈥檚 simple and obvious and does what you expect. Why can鈥檛 all 国产乱伦 systems be like that?鈥�