Ultriva’s Lean Solution Profiled in AS411.com
Ultriva, the lean leader, with an electronic kanban focus, is featured in the current issue of Accounting Software 411. Manufacturing journalist, TR Cutler, profiled Ultriva in a feature article titled, Becoming Lean: The Bottom-Line.
Ultriva (www.Ultriva.com) is live at over 120 plants across 10 countries. Companies like Emerson, BE Aerospace, Trane, Ingersoll-Rand, McKesson, AO Smith, FRANKE and AGCO among others are using Ultriva to collaborate with over 4000 suppliers and transacting $1.5 billion of purchased parts every year.
“Using solutions to synchronize production and material replenishment across the factory via a lean assessment produces impressive results. Order-to-ship lead times are reduced by over fifty percent, on-time delivery performance is improved by more than twenty percent, and work-in-progress (WIP) inventories are reduced up to forty percent,” according to Narayan Laksham, Founder and President of Ultriva, a lean solutions leader based in Cupertino, California.
Indeed a lean assessment impacts distribution, factories, and the supply chain. Lean distribution allows companies to manage finished goods inventory in a dynamic, efficient, and real-time environment. It provides the right product mix, visibility, stock, out alerts, and analytics to be fully streamlined. A lean factory process allows firms to orient production around customer demands instead of capacity optimization. Increased flexible scheduling allows adjustments to be made on the fly. Laksham insists that, “A lean supply chain allows for the replenishment system of choice including kanban, MRP orders, VMI, or 3PL, on a collaborative platform that seamless connects plants and suppliers.”
The lean supply chain is still largely controlled by MRP and ERP systems which use forecasted or planned demand to set up supplier replenishments. Every run generates changes to the existing demand while also creating new demands; the result is a series of inconsistencies across the supply chain, late shipments, costly expediting, and stock outs.
As manufacturing spreads horizontally, the global supply chain is becoming the most critical factor in determining customer demands. Laksham urges, “Managing this chain is no longer a matter of reducing costs but of optimizing a key process that is fueled by integration, trust, common metrics, and aligned goals.” One of the important methods utilized by Ultriva is the Supplier Portal for Purchase Order Execution which offers a platform to improve collaboration between plants and suppliers so they can interact and perform in synergy to deliver the right parts and the right time. This type of seamless integration between manufacturing plants and supply bases is best achieved through order visibility, exception alerts, inventory health, performance metrics, and analytics for continuous improvement. A single platform also allows for immaculate integration from kanban-based replenishment to MRP/forecast-driven supply.
Ultriva
Cindy McGowan
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Professional Marketing Firm for the Manufacturing Community and Manufacturing Journalist to most manufacturing magazines Article Source:http://www.articlesbase.com/software-articles/ultrivas-lean-solution-profiled-in-as411com-910799.html
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