Silverline Office Equipment has selected In2grate Business Solutions to replace its bespoke Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) system with Microsoft Dynamics NAV and TRIMIT NAV in a 3 year deal worth £230,000. The new solution will reduce the number of Bills of Materials (BOMs) from many thousands to less than 50 and in so doing, will facilitate other change management implementations that together will significantly improving customer service levels connected with its trademark range of customisable office equipment.
Peter Murray, Systems and Manufacturing Development Manager at Silverline explains: “Our steel office equipment portfolio is well-known for its contemporary design and high level of customisation, right down to having different drawer colour combinations on the same cabinet.
“After many years of working with a bespoke ERP system, we had created many thousands of end product Bills of Materials and had to augment them with numerous spreadsheets for business workflow purposes and management reporting. This was a complex process and therefore negative in terms of process lead time, cost and RFT (Right First Time), It was therefore crucial that we looked at new ways of working so that future sales order processing would simultaneously relay adjusted user workflow information in ‘real time’ to both shop floor and support department areas.”
Peter continued: “The new Microsoft Dynamics NAV and TRIMIT NAV based system from In2grate will therefore take us forward considerably in many areas of the business. One key area is that we expect to deliver a platform that will help us (in conjunction with our Lean MRP Continuous Improvement programme) to cut customer delivery times whilst better optimising resource to meet varying capacity requirements.”
The dramatic reduction in the number of BOMs required by the new system has other advantages. Dynamic cost calculations will run alongside them, enabling customer quotations to be created directly and accurately from the system in real time. Silverline will also be able to specify and cost new product ranges, extensions and variations within hours rather than weeks.
Peter Murray cites the close working relationship emphasised by In2grate, and the relationship between In2grate and TRIMIT as key factors in the company’s final selection: “In2grate made it clear to us in a variety of ways that our business was very important to them. Their obvious close relationship with TRIMIT (and hence Microsoft) plus the fact that TRIMIT visited from Denmark at In2grate’s request gave us great confidence in their commitment to a successful implementation and quality of the on-going support.
“It’s also clear to us also that In2grate recognises the culture and subcultures within organisations, and that they are able to adapt to each one to gain maximum buy-in from everyone involved. This is a vital element in any successful business transformation. We’re delighted to be working with both companies and to starting a new chapter in our business,” Peter Murray concludes.
