Successful introduction of EWM and MFS (as part of an S/4HANA transformation) at KARL BUBENHOFER AG
Customer: KARL BUBENHOFER AG (KABE)
Project duration: 22 months
Our customer:
KARL BUBENHOFER AG (KABE), headquartered in Switzerland, is an international leader in the development and manufacture of building paints, plasters, facade insulation and industrial and powder coatings. With numerous locations, the company has established itself as an industry expert. KABE offers comprehensive solutions for coating systems from a single source and attaches particular importance to close cooperation with its customers in order to develop customized coating solutions.
Initial situation:
The existing AS/400 system was to be replaced by SAP S/4HANA. The implementation of S/4HANA was originally initiated by a Swiss consulting firm. During the course of the project, errors during implementation and insufficient expertise led to KABE gradually dividing the tasks into modules and having them continued by various consulting firms. KABE took over the internal project management. Although the focus was on the headquarters in Gossau, the implementation was to take place in all three of the company's production and warehouse locations.
What did HPC accomplish?
HPC took over the intralogistics area during the S/4HANA implementation. The implementation was carried out on an embedded EWM on S/4HANA with an integrated material flow system (MFS). The implementation of the EWM basics had already been completed. However, KABE was unable to make any end-to-end bookings. The connections to the two automated warehouses at the Gossau and Arnegg sites and the mapping of the entire production supply and disposal were also missing. The warehouse processes were deliberately based on production and redesigned on a greenfield basis to ensure a close link between intralogistics and production.
- Integration of batch management
- Extended returns processing
- Separate picking of automated warehouse and manual warehouse
- Simplification of RF dialogs
- Implementation of user-friendly UI5 components, including a picking dialog
- Development of simplified mobile dialogs with the UI5 Converter for easy-to-understand operation
- Consistent handling of handling units (HU) and labels
- Semi-automatic packing
- Optimization of interfaces for seamless integration into production
- Development of a template approach for simple roll-outs to future locations
Customer benefits:
The implementation of SAP Extended Warehouse Management (SAP EWM) with Material Flow System (MFS) at KABE has led to numerous benefits. The holistic unification of processes in one system gives the company a clear overview of stocks with consistent postings. The linking of processes, increased efficiency in warehousing through system-supported consolidation of separate picking and simplified dialogues as well as the consistent tracking of handling units and labels contribute to optimized logistical coordination and greater transparency along the supply chain. The introduction of semi-automatic packing not only ensures an acceleration of the goods receipt process, but also a consistent and high-quality mapping of the physical packing structure in HUs. The optimization of interfaces and the developed template approach facilitate future roll-outs to other locations.
What were the challenges?
Cooperation with other SAP consulting firms often entails the risk of information loss in the design of consistent end-to-end processes, but our consultants successfully minimized this risk through effective communication and close cooperation.
KABE carried out the go-live at three locations simultaneously - a demanding challenge for our team, which accompanied the first steps in the new system with several consultants at the locations. The on-site teams were supported remotely by the EWM developers at HPC.
Perspective
The positive cooperation and the trust in our expertise are underlined by the fact that we are now allowed to implement a follow-up project at KABE. The focus here is on the introduction of the EWM system at a further site in Germany. This illustrates the ongoing partnership and the trust that KABE places in our services and cooperation.
