BSi Steel sees 20% growth thanks to digital transformation with KAISPE and Microsoft products

The challenges of a competitive steel market

Started in 1988, BSi Steel is a premium steel supplier and a top steel merchant in Africa. The company’s SA Operation handles the structural, mining, engineering, manufacturing, and automotive industries within South Africa. BSi Steel Exports LTD coordinates external business directly from its facility in Johannesburg. Its highly experienced Gauteng team is well placed to process and expedite small-volume and large-volume exports of a wide range of steel products to most African markets.

Due to constant fluctuation of steel prices, BSi Steel sales personnel were always in need of information about current market prices to better negotiate the profitability of a deal. Additionally, they needed to provide quotes in a timely manner in an extremely competitive market.

Building functionality with Dynamics 365

To address this issue, KAISPE provided replacement cost functionality on business documents like sales quotations, sales orders, and purchase orders through its Purchase Requisition App and other add-ons for Microsoft Dynamics 365, available on Microsoft AppSource. This supplied sales personnel with easy access to up-to-date and accurate information, yielding a 40 percent improvement across sales processes.

“Our costing issues are now greatly resolved,” said Andrew Wood, Group IT Executive, BSi Steel. “We are glad that we adopted Microsoft Dynamics 365 as our ERP application and appreciate how KAISPE helped us resolve this problem.”

Meeting purchase order and production needs

Another problem for BSi Steel was the inability to accurately track the differences occurring between purchase order receipts and invoices. Using the legacy application, staff performed complex customizations to handle such variance but frequently got inaccurate results, especially when items were consumed or sold during the receipt and invoice period. KAISPE proposed and implemented a moving average cost using Dynamics 365. This enabled them to correctly record the price difference and only when it was required.

In the production process, BSi Steel faced restrictions on orders for the de-coil and re-coil steps because raw materials and finished goods cannot be same in the normal discrete manufacturing process. KAISPE provided input functionality so users could enter the number of cuts required for the coil. This helped the production team know how many small coils were required. KAISPE also provided an option to select the same finished goods and raw material in the bill of materials, which allowed BSi Steel to select the same product as finished goods in production orders for the de-coil and re-coil process.

Satisfying executives with dashboards for greater visibility 

BSi Steel executives were looking for a simple yet powerful reporting platform to give them additional business insights and help them make accurate and timely decisions. Microsoft Power BI, along with Dynamics 365, SQL Server Analysis Services, and SQL Server Integration Services, gave them a consolidated view of the business via reports and dashboards. Reports like sales performance, inventory aging, and gross profit improved their planning and precision. 

In addition to Power BI, BSi Steel adopted Microsoft Power Apps, Power Automate, and SharePoint Online to develop productivity solutions, like Purchase Requisition App, for their employees. KAISPE integrated these with Dynamics 365 to make real-time data available at both ends. 

“KAISPE’s team has a good grip on Microsoft technologies and how they work together to generate value for customers,” Wood said.

After fueling 20 percent business growth with the digital transformation, BSi Steel is now exploring other modules and features in Dynamics 365 and is building Power BI reports and dashboards with productivity apps using Microsoft Power Platform. The company continues to engage with KAISPE.

“It's good to see how Microsoft Dynamics 365, along with other Microsoft technologies, helped out BSi Steel in achieving their digital transformation goals,” said Imran Mahmood, CEO, KAISPE LLC. “We are committed to adding more value to BSi’s business using our skill set and industry knowledge.”