CONSUMER PRODUCT GOODS (CPG)

Helping a Global Consumer Product Goods Company Improve Purchasing Efficiency and Meet New Federal Guidelines

Customer Profile: A global CPG company with sales exceeding $50 billion.

The Goal: Drive spend efficiencies, improve product purchase visibility across the enterprise and meet federal regulations related to manufacturing and inventory control.

Project Objective: Create clean, standardized, enriched product information to power the enterprise software systems

The Business Challenge

The client's challenge was to create significant cost savings through reduction of inflated inventory costs on its maintenance, repair, and operations (MRO) items. Buyers were often procuring these items outside of pre-approved inventories and at higher costs because product descriptions were inadequate. Specifically, inventoried item information did not contain sufficient attribute information to empower buyers to make good decisions.

Additionally, new government regulations, which placed tighter restrictions on all indirect materials entering the client's manufacturing facilities, forced the client to collect and standardize core MRO product data for procurement purposes. This would enable buyers to ensure greater integrity in all procurement functions while providing a more effective audit trail to report back to the government.

At the center of these two important objectives, the client wanted to build a custom catalog application for use by plant personnel. By installing its SAP Catalog Content Management platform, internal users could search across all approved inventory items for procurement functions. The system requires that any product data loaded into the application contain a specific data structure.

Understanding this, the client decided to use external expertise to:

Design and execute the processes required to collaborate with key suppliers to collect considerable volumes of MRO product data.
Define a content standard to govern all current and future data standardization.
Collect, clean and enrich supplier product information to adhere to the content standard.

The Solution

To meet their objectives, the client sought a partner that had deep experience in MRO item level data services, a specific competence with the SAP catalog software application, and an ability to augment client staff to work directly with key indirect material suppliers. ByteManagers, Inc. met all of these qualifications and delivered the following requested services.

Spend Categorization Services
ByteManagers categorized the client's product information to two commercial taxonomies, Requisite Unifying Structure (RUS) and UNSPSC. This categorization is an integral part of spend management.
Content Sourcing Service ByteManagers, through its Supplier Relations Program, sourced product information directly from all of the client's suppliers/vendors. This information included, but was not limited to:
- Electronic files, print catalogs, and technical datasheets containing rich attributed product information.
- Product images to be distributed in a print or online environment.
- Current, client-specific pricing and packaging information.
Product Information Normalization/Standardization Services
ByteManagers processed all product information so that it complied with SAP Catalog Content Management requirements.
Content Cleansing and Enhancement Services
ByteManagers created a complete "content standard" for the client. RUS was used as a base, to which the following additions and modifications were made:
- Additional attributes were added to further enhance the ability to make a buying decision.
- Units of measure (feet, pounds, inches, etc.) were standardized.
- Client-specific product descriptions were created.

Summary

Execution of this project achieved the following objectives:

The purchasing process was centralized, allowing control of maverick spending.
Spend was categorized, allowing complete analysis of historic spend.
Product information was analyzed to insure plant-level compliance to new federal regulations.
Processes to govern the introduction of new products into the product information architecture were implemented.
Enhanced product information led to substantial reduction in overall cost of inventory.
The client built a high value database asset.

ByteManagers Background:

Headquartered in Chicago, IL, ByteManagers is one of the largest established providers of content integration, definition, collection, build and enhancement, and normalization services. Our customers include Fortune 500 companies within MRO, CPG, Electronics, Industrial, Electrical, Chemicals, and Plumbing products, as well as software providers who offer turnkey solutions to a similar client base. With the assistance of ByteManagers, these companies have been able to produce and deliver their product information to multiple software platforms more quickly, cost-effectively, and to a higher degree of quality.