Glidewell collaborates with Avantiico to increase sales order processing by 12% with the same workforce using Dynamics 365

Glidewell Dental (Glidewell), one of the world’s largest dental service providers, recognized the need for a new enterprise resource planning (ERP) solution to streamline its complex supply chain. By collaborating with Microsoft partner Avantiico, Glidewell adopted Microsoft Dynamics 365 to unify its finance, supply chain management, inventory, and order fulfillment. This collaboration helped Glidewell reduce errors, improve inventory forecasting, and enhance order fulfillment visibility, setting the stage for broader automation and continued cost savings.

Smoothing out the supply chain with Dynamics 365

Founded in a dental lab in 1970, Glidewell has developed into one of the world’s leading producers of dental materials and equipment. As the company expanded globally, optimizing its supply chain became crucial. Glidewell’s reliance on disparate systems for inventory, finance, and supply chain management—including paper-based and manual processes—made tracking orders challenging and led to inaccurate forecasting, large inventories, and high costs.

Transitioning to a modern ERP system posed a significant challenge for Glidewell, given its locations in various regions and countries. The new solution needed to scale globally and process orders in multiple currencies. In 2020, Glidewell began investigating areas for improvement in its existing ERP.

Internal team communication was a major pain point. “Each team was in their separate system and trying to understand what was going on,” says Cory Fellers, Manager of Business Information Systems at Glidewell. “The previous system meant a lot of emails back and forth versus being able to see and track materials as they passed through shipping.”

Streamlining core business processes with Avantiico

After conducting a gap analysis, Glidewell realized that it needed to replace its ERP system and identified the essential features required. Automation of tasks like invoicing was crucial, necessitating future compatibility with Microsoft Power Automate. The new solution also had to integrate seamlessly with daily apps like Microsoft 365. Only one solution met all these requirements: Dynamics 365, specifically Dynamics 365 Finance and Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Management.

Eager to tackle its challenges, Glidewell aimed to onboard its manufacturing teams and accounting system to the new solution. However, implementing such a significant change required cross-company agreement. “Complete buy-in from top to bottom was key to getting a project at this level off the ground and completed,” says Fellers. “The executive team was very supportive, but we also had a very dedicated group.”

Adopting a new ERP system was just the beginning of Glidewell’s modernization journey. Although Dynamics 365 was the right solution, Glidewell needed a partner to assist with the implementation. Avantiico was the perfect fit, particularly in methodology. Avantiico worked side by side with Glidewell throughout the deployment of Dynamics 365, aiming to meet all business needs. Glidewell would learn from the implementation and eventually manage the system independently. “The idea is that we are going to teach them everything about our business, and they are going to teach us everything about Dynamics 365,” says Fellers.

Transforming manufacturing results

In May 2023, Glidewell successfully rolled out key business aspects with Dynamics 365 Finance. After months of meticulous planning, Glidewell, with the assistance of Avantiico, first deployed Dynamics 365 to its US labs, which constitute 80% of its employee base. This unified system removed transaction discrepancies and kept the implementation scope manageable. “If we had tried to go live with all aspects of the business simultaneously, it would have been overwhelming,” says Fellers.

Avantiico focused on optimizing Glidewell’s supply chain (warehousing and manufacturing) and accounting processes. Now, employees from these teams can create and edit documents, manage emails, and analyze data within a single ERP system. This integration provides Glidewell with insights from a single source of truth, enhancing collaboration and visibility through automated entry and intelligent tracking of shipping processes.

Additionally, teams can now generate automatic business reports using Microsoft Power BI and Dynamics 365, optimizing inventory management and forecasting. The company has seen a 12% increase in daily sales orders fulfilled with a corresponding reduction of 40% in order fulfillment costs. Also, Glidewell accelerated the processing of purchase orders by 28% without the need for additional procurement staff.

With Dynamics 365, Glidewell is well positioned to continue automating all order processing while maintaining low overhead. ”The implementation with the integrations really created a platform for them,” says Traci Rayburn, Program Manager and Senior Project Manager at Avantiico. “It’s the bedrock to start modernizing the rest of their systems.”

Going all in for innovative ERP and a promising future

Glidewell’s partnership with Avantiico continues. In the months since the initial deployment of Dynamics 365 to its US labs, Glidewell has conducted end-to-end inventory and production management for its lab product division. Avantiico is also assisting with the recent launch of the Glidewell Colombia business unit within Dynamics 365. The final phase of the initial implementation will onboard three locations in Mexico, all under Avantiico’s guidance.

The company is now more synced than ever, with employees united by a shared vision of the future. “Going all in on Microsoft ERP means everyone now knows where to go and who is doing what,” says Lisa Maxson, Chief Financial Officer at Glidewell.

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