Computacenter

Computacenter Reduces Business-to-Business Order Processing by up to 40 Per Cent

Computacenter, one of the largest IT infrastructure service providers in Europe, wanted to streamline its supply chain management by encouraging more suppliers to accept orders online. It aims to achieve the lowest possible cost base for administration of business-to-business purchasing. Microsoft® Gold Certified Partner Solidsoft implemented an order processing system using Microsoft ASP.NET and Microsoft Identity Integration Server with Microsoft BizTalk® Server 2006 as an integration tool and Microsoft SQL Server™ 2005 database software. As a result, many systems within Computacenter have been integrated with their suppliers—customers will follow shortly—with BizTalk Server as the electronic hub. Computacenter has cut the number of orders previously handled manually by up to 40 per cent and minimised the risk of errors in working with small and medium-sized suppliers.

Situation

Europe’s leading independent provider of IT services and computer systems—Computacenter—serves its corporate and government customers from offices in the United Kingdom (U.K.) and mainland Europe. Its expertise covers technology sourcing, infrastructure integration, and managed services. The U.K.-listed firm helps customers maximise the value of IT, minimise costs, and realise the business value of their assets. In 2007, group revenues reached £2.38 billion (U.S.$4.7 billion).

In today’s ever evolving business landscape, successful operators are those optimising the use of technology to create business agility and efficiency, especially when purchasing from small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Many SMEs lack sophisticated business process management systems and rely on e-mail messages for purchase orders and manual accounting systems. Computacenter was no exception—it had a “long tail” of SMEs in its supply chain as well as much bigger suppliers with sophisticated systems.

Our systems need to support each of our businesses appropriately, whether it’s our e-commerce service Computacenter Express, government or corporate customers, or CCD, a division of Computacenter that distributes to other resellers. Mike Beral, Head of IS Strategic Solutions, Computacenter

In a competitive market, flexibility and effectiveness in sourcing products is a key differentiator for Computacenter. But, at the same time, the company needs to offer the widest range of stock to its customers without overstocking its inventory. “The range offered is sometimes different depending on the market segment,” says Mike Beral, Head of IS Strategic Solutions at Computacenter. “Our systems need to support each of our businesses appropriately, whether it’s our e-commerce service Computacenter Express, government or corporate customers, or CCD, a division of Computacenter that distributes to other resellers.”

In 2006, the company decided to look for a business partner with the skill sets to improve supply chain integration at Computacenter, focusing on customers that were not using eXtensible Markup Language (XML) to link to its systems and were using e-mail messaging for orders. “Our major driver was for the lowest possible cost base for purchasing administration,” says Beral. “We wanted to automate as much as possible of the transaction processing, using intelligent rules where appropriate to provide for manual exception handling and escalations. But we also wanted the absolute minimum of manual intervention for processing routine transactions to reduce costs and help us shift our human resources to higher skilled work. ”

With around 1,500 sales orders and purchase orders a day—each averaging three lines—Computacenter felt there were at least 100 of its existing suppliers with which it could trade electronically as well as customers on the other side of the supply chain. “So we began the search for a logistics and integration expert to set up and manage a Web-based interface for suppliers to receive purchase orders online, and provide progress and eventually dispatch data about those orders,” says Beral.

Solution

Computacenter decided to work with Solidsoft—Microsoft® Global Partner of the Year 2006–2007 for Business Process and Integration Solutions Development. A Microsoft Gold Certified Partner, Solidsoft is a globally recognised specialist in the delivery of business process management and integration solutions built in the Microsoft environment. The implementation plan that Computacenter envisaged involved creating new functions using Microsoft BizTalk® Server 2006 and Microsoft SQL Server™ 2005 and Microsoft Identity Integration Server as key building blocks, with the Microsoft .NET Framework as the development system and Web pages designed with Microsoft ASP.NET

Computacenter’s existing systems included:

• An enterprise resource planning system with JBA Geac System21 running on an IBM iSeries environment.
• An internal sales system called One Touch running on Blue Martini.
• A Web shop environment Connect, running on Blue Martini.
• A standard integration layer using Microsoft BizTalk Server 2004.

The overall solution, code-named Accord, consists of three interrelated yet distinct areas of functionality:

• Product catalogue management to automatically maintain current stock price and availability information sent from suppliers.
• Purchase order process management over the Internet with fully integrated suppliers.
• A supplier portal for use by non-integrated suppliers.

Further sophisticated add-ons, such as a fully developed order management console and a preferred supplier algorithm were also developed. Garth Pickup, Chief Executive Officer, Solidsoft, says: “The beauty of using the .NET Framework and BizTalk Server at the heart of the solution is that we can use the same tool for application-to-application and business-to-business connections. Not only that, but as with all of the .NET server products from Microsoft, the licence costs can be dramatically lower than products sourced from other vendors.”

The beauty of using the .NET Framework and BizTalk Server at the heart of the solution is that we can use the same tool for application-to-application and business-to-business connections. Garth Pickup, Chief Executive Officer, Solidsoft

For the virtual supply model to work effectively for Computacenter, as much information as possible needed to be exchanged with Computacenter’s supply chain partners, principally for catalogue, pricing, stock availability, request for quotation, purchase order, order acknowledgement, and tracking.

Pickup says: “Solidsoft took the initial thinking from Computacenter and designed and developed Accord to be as flexible as possible. It is important for Computacenter to have as many suppliers as possible using the system to drive down the costs of processing purchase orders and reduce the potential for errors. This also provided the opportunity to retire the previously existing and somewhat inflexible enterprise content integration links to suppliers.”

Benefits

Computacenter is driving out costs in processing orders and, with BizTalk Server 2006 and SQL Server 2005, has increased efficiency and reduced any potential for errors. Because the system is fully automated Computacenter staff can deal by exception and track any of the 1,500 orders a day that aren’t being dealt with by a supplier. As a result, manual handling of supplier orders has been reduced by between 30 to 40 per cent generating better margins and improving efficiency and profit.

Manual Handling of Orders Cut by up to 40 Per Cent
Computacenter is on course with its new supplier management system to achieve “frictionless transactions,” according to Beral. “We’re cutting back on the huge volume of e-mail messages in the previous system and are finding it much easier to work with SMEs through the new portal. Previously, only around 10 to 15 larger suppliers were integrated. Now, more than 500 are using our supplier portal and we expect to have 40 to 50 suppliers using an XML-based business model by the end of 2008. We’ve cut the amount of manual processing by between 30 and 40 per cent with our new purchase order processing solution.”

Quality of Information Improves Accuracy of Pricing
With the Web-based solution, Computacenter is confident that business efficiency is improving through a reduced capacity for errors and greater consistency in pricing. “The user interface is very customer friendly for our suppliers and our 70 internal users,” says Beral. “The look and feel of the tools is highly familiar thanks to Microsoft technology. Opting for Microsoft building blocks for our enterprise content integration hub was a fairly natural decision and Solidsoft had the expertise to deliver the results we wanted as a business partner. The result is that we now have more accurate pricing and fewer exceptions to manage.”

Value for Money from the Lowest Possible Administration Cost Base
Using Microsoft integration technology through BizTalk Server 2006, Solidsoft is giving Computacenter the lowest possible cost base for purchasing administration. The system will grow with the company’s needs and is helping to enhance its reputation for flexible and effective sourcing of products.

“The work is ongoing,” says Beral. “But we already have much better value for money and consistency and have significantly reduced our previously high cost base for administering suppliers. The next step will be to apply similar methods to interactions with our customers.”

Partner Expertise Ensures Maximum Use of Existing IT Assets
Solidsoft is providing significant technical expertise in ensuring integration with existing IT assets. Computacenter supplies IT consultancy and computer systems, but, as it responds to changing market conditions, the company needed to reengineer several of its sourcing processes.

Supply chain integration is easy to say, but hard to do. The integration work with BizTalk Server is ongoing and is likely to extend into other areas, such as handling sales order messages from customers in the future. Garth Pickup, Chief Executive Officer, Solidsoft

Pickup says: “As industry experts have reported in multiple case studies and white papers, supply chain integration is easy to say, but hard to do. The integration work with BizTalk Server is ongoing and is likely to extend into other areas, such as handling sales order messages from customers in the future.”

Product Offers to Double
With the new supply chain management system using BizTalk Server, Computacenter is confident that it could offer an even wider range of products to its customers. “We currently list around 60,000 products, but we believe the U.K. market alone can support more than twice this number,” says Beral. “Sales should be able to make most of the sourcing decisions, based on information made available to them through appropriate systems and intelligent rules.” 

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Document published April 2008