SAP Customer Success Story | Manufacturing| BTL Plastics

The combination of SAP

Business One and PPS One
fitted the bill perfectly.

SAP Customer Success Story | Manufacturing| BTL Plastics

Executive overview

Company
BTL Plastics

Why SAP?

Industry
Manufacturing

Solution
Benefits

Products and Services

Plastic parts for industrial vehicles and electrical
equipment
Website
www.btlplastics.com
SAP solutions
SAP Business One
Partner
Vigor

BTL Plastics from Wielsbeke (Belgium) manufactures plastic parts for industrial
vehicles as well as housings and casings for electrical equipment. Just a few examples?
The dashboard of an excavator, the housing of a ventilation system or the mudguards
of a bulldozer. The SME recently implemented SAP Business One and PPS One, with
the help of Vigor, to support its growth. The result? Improved services and (even)
more satisfied customers , fewer errors and impressive time savings!
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SAP Customer Success Story | Manufacturing| BTL Plastics

Executive overview

Ready for the future

Why SAP?
Solution
Benefits

The customers of BTL Plastics are all multinationals

from Europe, the Americas and Asia. Each of them is
very demanding. To attain supplier certification from
our key customer, we cannot have more than one
rejected item out of a total of two thousand delivered
parts. Not one single European company in our sector
can meet that standard; except for us: we have been
complying with that stringent standard every year, for
the past five years, says owner Benoit Braet.

BTL Plastics wanted to replace its existing solutions

by a transparent, online, user-friendly, automated
and efficient ERP system. The search for the right
package and partner was exhaustive. Vigor and
SAP clearly stood out, says Benoit Braet: Some
software packages look familiar at first sight, yet are
disappointing as soon as you take a deeper dive. SAP
was new to us and seemed very complex. The trial,
however, proved that the combination of SAP Business
One and PPS One, an add-on for manufacturing
solutions, fitted the bill perfectly. The results that
Vigor showed were correct, quickly modelled and the
possibilities seemed endless.

The focus on quality and services has served BTL

Plastics well: the company is flourishing. Benoit Braet:
Just recently we have built an extra warehouse, in
order to be ready for the future. Our EPR system
too, was in need of a major expansion. The simple
accounting package and the databases that we had
developed ourselves to support specific applications,
had reached their limits.

The trial, however, proved that the combination of SAP Business One and PPS One
fitted the bill perfectly.
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SAP Customer Success Story | Manufacturing| BTL Plastics

Executive overview

The secret? A painstaking preparation

Why SAP?
Solution
Benefits

Besides the software package, the partner who helps

choose and install the system is crucial too. Vigor has
in-house experts for every SAP functionality. Just take
accounting, for example. The Vigor expert for accounting
worked closely with our financial team; they really spoke
the same language, Benoit Braet continued.

I must admit I was a bit doubtful about the transition,

said Benoit Braet. You hear all those stories about
complex, tedious ERP implementations. I assume these
are often due to a poor preparation or a lack of knowhow. We didnt experience any problem, really. On the
contrary, our customers say they felt better served and
better informed from day one. Our internal sales team
can now promptly and accurately answer customer
questions, e.g. on the availability of a product or when it
will be manufactured.

Developer Gerrit Liviau was in charge of the migration to

SAP, together with the Vigor team: Vigor suggested that
we first analyse all our business processes in detail. We
grabbed the opportunity to improve our internal coding
system. The preparatory phase took us a year. A long
time, indeed, yet that was our secret to going live without
a hitch. The employees who would be working with SAP
had ample time to practice before the go-live. In this way
everyone understood that (s)he is part of a chain and
his/her work impacts that of his/her colleagues.

Vigor suggested that we first analyse all our business processes in detail. The
preparatory phase took us a year. A long time, indeed, yet that was our secret to
going live without a hitch.
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SAP Customer Success Story | Manufacturing| BTL Plastics

Executive overview

Less errors, more time

Why SAP?
Solution
Benefits

We are now running one, single system. That

means we only have to maintain just one system.
The software is so exhaustive and provides all the
information we need, such as production times,
full work instructions, even the hourly rates of the
machines. We can perfectly plan our production
capacity. We have a real-time view on our stock
levels, at every moment in the manufacturing
process, the owner continues.

The time savings, too, are a major asset. Benoit

Braet: As soon as I enter a query, I get an answer
to my question; whereas, in the past, I needed
two hours to get that information. Calculating
the value of our stocks took several days; now its
done in seconds. If the price of our raw materials
changes, we dont need our calculator the price is
automatically changed in the system.
Thanks to these time savings, we can generate
more turnover, whilst also improving our customer
services, without hiring more people. Weve really
taken some big steps forward. And you feel that we
havent reached the limits of the system yet. Theres
hundreds of optional features in SAP that we dont
need yet, but may be useful in the future. I would
even venture to say that this is a revolution. I cant
imagine how we managed to do it all in the past.

The entire manufacturing process is interconnected,

which Benoit considers a major advantage: When
a customer orders a product, we purchase the raw
materials. The invoice for those raw materials is
provided immediately upon their delivery and is then
automatically linked to that order. Then we produce
and ship the product and the invoice is immediately
forwarded too. Everything is linked in one big,
transparent chain. And as we have to enter less data,
the error margin drops significantly.

Thanks to these time savings, we can generate more turnover, whilst also improving
our customer services, without hiring more people. Weve taken some really big steps
forward. And you feel that we havent reached the limits of the system yet.
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