Nashik headquartered ALF Engineering accelerates business innovation driven by SAP S/4 HANA 1709

The automotive industry comes as one of the most prominent industrial segments across the globe and is the harbinger of disruptive innovations. The industry of late is witnessing unique challenges fueled by cut-throat price competition and changing customer demands.

The changing market landscape has concluded in automotive and its allied verticals including OEMs to better streamline their operations and incline towards data-driven decision making for optimal business efficiency.

Sailing through a similar scenario, Alf Engineering, the tier-1 supplier for automotive chassis to OEMs such as Mahindra & Mahindra, Tata Motors, Ashok Leyland and Daimler Benz, producing over 1500 frames per day was on the lookout for a robust platform to centralize its operations.

The organisation with a 3500 strong workforce was seeking to avail information from multiple data points spread across geographies on a single digital platform.

Kiran Kulkarni, Project Manager, ALF Engineering, said: ‘’We wanted to catalyze product innovation with actionable data and control operational costs. Our objective was also to modernize business practices for enhanced market reach".

After a stringent evaluation of a host of platforms and enterprise technology solutions providers, ALF Engineering betted on Savic Technologies for the deployment of industry-leading SAP S/4 HANA solution.

Sarang Bhanage, DGM Costing & QA, ALF Engineering, added: “We aimed to integrate various functions, departments & geographies within ALF ENGINEERING PVT. LTD. on a single digital core platform. We also wanted to infuse SAP Global Best Practices for unified SoPs and materialize an implementation landscape recommended by SAVIC, including harmonized purchasing, sales, and manufacturing resource planning".

Savic Technologies after a comprehensive assessment of the business challenges and growth objectives of ALF Engineering implemented SAP S/4HANA version 1709 with modules including  financial accounting, costing, procurement, inventory management, production, quality, sales & supply chain.

Within a few months of the deployment, ALF Engineering witnessed astounding business benefits including a 7 percent reduction in inventory and a 360-degree visibility of stocks and inventory movements. The organisation also observed a 70 percent reduction in month end closing activities including stocks, books of accounts etc.

Ashwin Nazareth, Management, ALF Engineering, said: ‘’The migration yielded results we were expecting, including the transition to a modern platform that will accelerate innovation and our digital transformation. The tools worked as designed, and the migration was successful without any business disruption”.

Some other key business benefits which SAP S/4 HANA 1709 empowered ALF Engineering with include 

• Improved operational efficiency across geographies
• Better inventory visibility for in-terms of quantity and value
• Clear financial and management reporting
• Online, anywhere product costing