Anglo-Nordic

Background

Anglo-Nordic was in need for a user-friendly reporting solution to enhance the presentation of its sales-, procurement and warehousing data.

The old cube-based reporting system had, according to financial manager Johan Hilli, proven to be rather inflexible, and a consultant was needed every time changes were made. The old system did not have a web-based interface, either.

After a suitability study carried out by Affecto, a shortlist of three reporting systems was draw up, and Business Objects was then selected. Hilli explains that SAP’s acquisition of Business Objects facilitated this decision, as the integration impact was deemed favourable.

Solution

“The goal was to find a program that shows the entire logistics chain from purchase to sales. SAP can generate certain reports but we wanted information in a more refined form. With Business Objects, we deployed SAP Rapid Mart components.”

SAP Rapid Mart is a readymade data warehouse solution that considerably speeds up deployment.  Hilli says that there are many different Rapid Mart options. Anglo Nordic uses Rapid Mart Sales and Rapid Mart Inventory. The procurement side, however, has been separately customised for Business Objects use.

“We have created some basic reports for the needs of the end user, so they don’t have to make choices themselves. There are also some ad hoc reports. There, they can select, for example, a certain retailer and period of time. Rapid Mart makes it easy to create reports.”

The reporting service was deployed quickly. Including specifications, the project took only a few months. Three experts from Affecto participated in the project. Hilli says that Affecto’s service since the deployment has also been good. Anglo Nordic has a support agreement with Affecto which has enabled Angle Nordic to receive help whenever needed.

“Initially, we were also going to develop budgeting and planning. We are still considering whether to implement this, as well, with Rapid Marts.”

“There are a number of minor projects active all the time. The most recent of them is the installation of the dashboard that clearly shows the state of things. Broader deployment is still to come,” Hilli explains.

Hilli also praises Affecto as a training organisation. During Affecto Academy’s courses, he and the person in charge of Anglo Nordic’s information technology acquainted themselves with the use of the dashboard and other modules. 

Customer benefits

“The program has proven reliable in use. The reports that retailers and vendors need can now be obtained easily through automatic reporting. When a report is made once and the recipients are added, the report can be sent in Excel or PDF format. After this, you can forget about it,” Hilli explains.

There are many options for selecting the day and time a report should be sent. Anglo Nordic currently has about forty different automatic reports.

Reporting is an important additional service

Anglo Nordic is a family-owned import and wholesale company, which was established in 1935. With some 60 regular employees, the turnover of the company is approximately €110 million. The majority of the turnover comes from multimedia, which includes mobile phones and televisions, among other products. Office and school equipment, tools and sports gear are the other cornerstones of the company.

“Just like a chair has four legs, we have four business units. This makes business easier when the general financial situation changes, as not all units react to the changes in the same way. This has enabled us to make a profit for more than 15 consecutive years now, " Hilli explains.

There is tough competition between wholesale distributors, and Anglo Nordic has developed a variety of services. For example, the replenishment system for customer products makes sure that when the customer’s inventory level goes below a certain point, Anglo Nordic provides more products to the retailers. Anglo Nordic also offers shelf imaging software to the customers for optimising shelf sales positions.

Hilli explains that additional services are needed in order to keep the customers and vendors satisfied. Reporting is also part of the service. It is important that the report is obtained at a certain time and on a certain day.

Thanks to reporting, monitoring is real-time and accurate. This way, inventory levels can be optimised, and an overview of the entire sales situation can be obtained.