The challenge
Four plants ran four different systems. Consolidated reporting took a fortnight and finance had stopped trusting it.
Our approach
We spent the first two weeks on the floor rather than in a meeting room. Four plants, four systems, and four different definitions of "finished goods" — which is why consolidation had been taking a fortnight and why the previous attempt had stalled.
The fit-gap register produced 31 genuine gaps. Nineteen we closed with configuration, eight with process change agreed by the plant managers, and four with development. We fixed the go-live date at the end of week two and did not move it.
“The handover documentation was good enough that my team ran the second plant rollout themselves.”
What we built
One chart of accounts across all four plants, with intercompany elimination automated rather than assembled manually at close. Plant-floor scanning publishes what was actually consumed, so MRP reconciles against reality instead of intention.
Migration was rehearsed three times with reconciliation reports signed by the group financial controller before we went near production. Cutover ran over a planned shutdown weekend with a rollback point at each of the six stages.
- SAP Business One
- PostgreSQL
- Azure
- Power BI
- Custom scanning integration
Results
Month-end close moved from eleven days to three within two quarters. Stockouts fell 62% in the first year because MRP was finally working from accurate consumption data.
The client ran the fourth plant rollout themselves, using our runbooks, with two days of our time for review. That was the outcome we had designed for from the start.
What’s next
A production-planning optimisation phase is scoped for 2027, and the client is evaluating whether to bring the fourth plant onto our managed service.
Figures are taken from the client’s own reporting and published with their permission. We will introduce you to them on request.