Providing independent business systems advice to distribution companies
William Levene
A wholesale distributor of kitchenware products and a sister company which sell and distribute products as a result of direct response TV advertisements. Products include the "Magican" and "Safetycan" can openers. There are also products promoted by well-known television personalities such as Ken Hom and Madhur Jaffrey. Head-office is in London with a warehouse in Birmingham where some light assembly work is undertaken. Existing computer systems included entirely bespoke systems running on a Unisys multi-user computer.
Assisted with specification of requirements and selection of appropriate wholesale distribution systems.
Scale
2 UK locations, 45+ employees, £30m+ turnover, UK & Export markets.
Scope of requirements
Stock, warehouse management, sales order processing & invoicing, works order processing, replenishment forecasting, purchasing, EDI, Intrastat, sales analysis, financial ledgers, marketing, CRM.
Old legacy system - exisiting application software was over 10 years old and becoming increasingly difficult to maintain and could not provide the necessary information in a suitable form to facilitate effective management of the business.
Limited management information - more comprehensive management information was required on a prompt basis to control the business and to fulfill performance reporting requirements efficiently.
Inflexible system - a flexible system was required which could easily be adapted and implemented to meet new business requirements.
EDI & e-business integration - systems were required allowing the use where appropriate of EDI and e-business services.
Support for business growth - systems were required which would be capable of handling the anticipated future growth and enable staff numbers to be contained while allowing for increases in transaction volumes.
The specification of requirements in the form of an ITT was issued to three potential suppliers following a comprehensive supplier pre-qualification exercise. Proposals were received from all three suppliers with the resulting evaluation concluding that only two should be shortlisted for further investigation. Detailed demonstrations by the two shortlisted suppliers were organised using test data supplied by the client, along with visits to appropriate reference sites. The preferred solution was a comprehensive distribution package running on IBM AS/400 hardware.
Microguide Corporate Computer Consultants, 82 Shortlands Road, Kingston-upon-Thames, KT2 6HE
Tel: 020 8549 7152
Fax: 020 8549 8112
Email:enquiry@microguide.co.uk
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