Pilkington is set to go live with software designed to predict demand for its autoglass aftermarket, after the firm found the required level of functionality was not available in its main enterprise resource planning system. Pilkington used a global SAP system hosted in Germany. However, when it tried to use the system to forecast demand to improve inventory planning, Pilkington found insufficient flexibility. "Like many ERP systems, specialist functionality like demand & inventory planning is not sufficient for complex businesses like ours, & we sought a best-of-breed solution to complement our core ERP platform", said Mike Ball, project director for Pilkington Automotive Glass Replacement. Pilkington is therefore investing £250,000 to implement Infor's SCM Demand Planning system alongside SAP to improve demand forecasting & reduce inventory. The glass manufacturer required forecasting processes based on true demand, which includes orders and enquiries, and which had the flexibility to manage its pan-European, multi-channel structure, Mr. Ball said. "Also our supply chain is quite complex. We need to understand how each customer behaves. With Infor SCM, we can model every product for every customer at every location and really see the trends". Pilkington plans to measure the benefits of the system by reviewing service levels at its Swedish wholesale business and two other customers. "The estimate on this limited basis is that it will pay for itself within nine months", Ball said. The Infor system uses internal collaboration from sales teams and external forecasts from customers. It runs on an Oracle database with a Windows or browser interface.
