The Sihl Group brings order to chaos with a modern supply chain management system
Faster reactions | Transparency in the flow of information | Improved collaboration
The Sihl Group has grown successfully in recent years - but with it grew also the challenges of IT. Because more locations, more processes, more complexity. Due to the takeover of numerous companies, the Sihl Group's IT structure became a mosaic of different systems and processes - each valuable in its own right, but difficult to manage together. A centralized solution was needed - one that would take the flow of information between all locations to a new level. A modern supply chain management system (SCM) needed to combine the best of all worlds and bring the entire flow of goods and information on track across all locationsin order to make processes more efficient, responsive and transparent.
Analysis and customized strategy
In order to reconcile the variety of systems and the need for cross-location efficiency, the Sihl Group put together a specialized team of internal specialists and experts from objective partner. The first joint step: a thorough analysis of the existing IT landscape and processes.
"After that, our goal was clear: preserve existing structures while linking the systems intelligently. With the PULL method, we have achieved exactly that - demand-oriented data transfer that works reliably without unnecessarily burdening the system."
Markus Rodler, SAP Business Development Specialist
Near-time: immediate responsiveness to market changes
The requirement was clear: information should be available in near real time to enable quick reactions and well-founded decisions. The solution: a near-time connection for the SAP integration of the SCM system. This connection offers a demand-oriented flow of information that significantly improves the efficiency and timeliness of data transfer without overloading the systems.
Step by step:
How the project succeeded
The integration of the SCM system took place in several phases:
- Analysis and planning:
Identification of all relevant data points and process requirements. - Event-driven integration:
Step-by-step connection of document types for the SCM process to ensure that every data transfer is reliable and efficient. - Testing and fine-tuning:
Thorough testing and customization guaranteed a stable and responsive solution that meets the Sihl Group's requirements.
Successes that pay off every day
Following the successful implementation of the new SCM system and the near-connection, the Sihl Group has made significant progress: The supply chain processes now run smoothly and react quickly to market changes. Customer satisfaction has increased thanks to the optimized process handling, and cross-location collaboration is also benefiting from the new transparency and efficiency in the flow of information.
Advantages at a glance:
One of our biggest challenges was to maintain the existing IT systems while enabling the integration of new SAP solutions - without any compromises. Thanks to objective partner's customized adaptations, our information flow was significantly improved, which noticeably increases the flexibility and efficiency of our processes on a daily basis.
