Atlas Hydraulics
Case Study: Atlas Hydraulics
Company: Atlas Hydraulics
Industry: Manufacturer of hydraulic hoses and tubing for the agricultural, construction & forestry industries.
Location: Brantford, ON, Canada
Key Challenges
• ERP with extensive multi-plant/multicompany
capabilities, advanced EDI integration and tight MRP control
Key Benefits
• Comprehensive functionality out-of-thebox, no modifications or customization
• Improvement in inventory accuracy, from 90% to 98.8%
• 100% on-time shipping to largest customer
• Multi-plant/multi-company capabilities enable central management of 5 plants and 3 distinct companies
• Critical to enabling opening of Mexican plant, enabling retention of largest customer’s business
• Fully scalable as company sales double and expands to multiple new facilities
• 2 person (part time) IT department manages multi plant/multi international system
The Situation
Centrally managing everything from production, purchasing and inventory to financials for five plants, organized into three distinct companies located in three countries presents some extraordinary challenges, for sure, but it’s business-asusual for Atlas Hydraulics. The Brantford, Ontario-based company is a tier-one supplier of hydraulic hoses and tubing to an array of leading global agricultural, construction and forestry equipment manufacturers,. From the Brantford headquarters, company managers monitor and direct all interand intra-plant processes and logistics pertaining to the manufacture of 40,000 parts and the purchase of 6,000 others, all to meet the delivery, quality and cost requirements of customers throughout Canada, the US and Mexico. Frank Beattie, Atlas’ Manager of IT and Inventory, attributes much of his company’s ability to manage such a complex multi-plant/multi-company environment to Solarsoft iVP. Atlas established three new plants, one in western Canada, a second in Greenville, South Carolina and a third in Ramos, Mexico - after the Solarsoft iVP implementation, with the Greenville plant and the Mexican plant operating as distinct companies.
The Solution
Solarsoft provides tools to help Atlas retain largest customer “We built those plants because that’s where our customers are. We need to be as close to them as we can,” says Beattie. “We’re making component parts in Brantford and shipping huge volumes, over 50% of our sales to Mexico and Greenville. NEverything’s handled by SolarsoftN iVP in the background, allowing us to Plan and track each transaction, price everything accordingly and comply with all governmental requirements without creating invoices and related documentation. It takes a lot of planning to pull that off and Solarsoft iVP does it perfectly.” In fact, without Solarsoft iVP, Beattie’s not sure Atlas could have retained a significant portion of its largest customer’s business. In the fall of 2009, this particular customer moved a massive manufacturing operation from Ontario a 45-minute drive from the Atlas plants in Brantford to Ramos, Mexico. Forfeiting that business was not a viable option, preserving it would require a heavy reliance on Solarsoft iVPs multi-plant/ company capabilities, as well as its range of integrated functionality, particularly MRP and EDI.
Results & Benefits
“Solarsoft’s MRP functionality is tight, classic and dependable. We’re able to schedule our processes in Brantford the brazing, plating and bending and plan our materials shipments to Mexico with confidence,” says Beattie. “The integrated MRP and shop floor control functionality in Solarsoft is critical to improving our planning and execution and allowed us to double our business without adding overhead.” We can handle a one week to two week transportation time to Mexico because Solarsoft has dramatically improved our inventory accuracy. We’re retaining a lot of jobs in Brantford because of that.”
Atlas achieves high supplier ratings with all their key customers and was named "Supplier of the Year" in 2009 at three different global companies, successes Beattie credits to the strength of these customers’ forecasting ability and Solarsoft’s integrated functionality, including EDI. Prior to Solarsoft, all orders were entered manually and scheduling was done via spreadsheet. Since the Solarsoft iVP implementation, most key customers business is done via EDI or electronic uploads. “We have traditionally shipped 100% on time with our largest customer, which you can only do if your data is perfectly accurate which EDI ensures and integrated throughout a strong infrastructure, like Solarsoft iVP,” says Beattie. Solarsoft improves inventory accuracy Beattie also pays close attention to Solarsoft’s impact on inventory control. “Cycle counting is near and dear to my heart, but with a 6 week lead time on our tubes and 1 week on our hoses, cycle counting wasn’t even an option prior to Solarsoft. We backflushed our inventory as we shipped and performed one physical inventory annually, which created more chaos than it solved.”
By leveraging Solarsoft iVPs real time shop floor control Beattie now performs cycle counts 220 days per year, contributing to a 98.8% inventory accuracy rating, up from approximately 90% prior to Solarsoft iVP. Though the remote locations have access to Solarsoft iVP, responsibility for managing all critical day to day operational and departmental functions at each plant is centralized in Brantford. “I don’t know how we would have handled all these locations if not for Solarsoft,” says Beattie. “We probably wouldn’t have been able to build our Mexican plant, and maybe not South Carolina. At the very least, we’d have been looking at stand-alone systems for each plant, each requiring its own support group.” Solarsoft, running with no modifications, enable lean IT department Atlas utilizes nearly all of Solarsoft iVP’s functionality, with no modifications or customization, which affords Atlas Hydraulics the luxury of a lean IT department. Just Beattie and one other person share part-time responsibilities for managing the system and its IBM System i platform. “Because I would be responsible from an IT standpoint, I really wanted the IBM System i from the beginning of our evaluation process, and it’s proven itself to be bullet proof,” says Beattie. “Even the younger guys, who were initially pushing for a Windows solution, came to realize the power and dependability of the System i.”
From the standpoint of functionality, scalability, day-to-day manageability and dependability of the total Solarsoft iVP/ IBM System i solution, Beattie sums up his experience simply. “It fits us to a ‘T’ and has from the beginning. We spent a year shopping around, and I just don’t think we could have found a better fit for our business.”
