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uniq Plc

SolarSoft for manufacturing

cuStoMer SPotlight

At-a-glance• Industry: Chilled food manufacturing• Location: Minsterley, Northampton, Paignton, UK

Key Challenges• Replace paper-based and bespoke

systems• Provide flexibility in production,

without loss of efficiency

Solution• Tropos ERP

Key Benefits• More control and visibility of

manufacturing activities• Less wastage• Faster reaction to problems• Improved customer service, including speedier dispatch and invoicing • Improved traceability of products and raw materials• Shorter lead times• Data sharing saves time and increases accuracy• Paper eliminated

troPoS WaS Particularly Strong on reciPe ManageMent, Which iS at the core of our buSineSS. And it was one of the few packages with strong support for the process industry

Mike Spalding, IT director, Uniq PLC

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In the late 1990s, food manufacturer Unigate (now Uniq plc) embarked on a multi-million-pound plan to update the manufacturing and financial systems at its UK factories.

It decided to pilot the approach at its factory in Paignton, Devon, by introducing Solarsoft’s Tropos. The plant produces over one million desserts a week, including the popular Cadbury-branded products. Trifles are the main product, followed by profiteroles and cheesecakes.

Uniq’s product cycle changes constantly because of trends in food consumption. Its retail customers often demand changes in packaging or content within weeks. For example, some may want more custard while others order more fruit.

flexibility anD efficiency are crucial “Being able to change our manufacturing process without losing efficiency is crucial,” said IT director Mike Spalding. “The Tropos system we are using is very sophisticated and reduces wastage.”

When selecting a manufacturing system, the unique nature of the manufacturing process at Uniq had to be taken into account. Uniq receives orders to produce its chilled foods and deliver them on the same day. Orders can come in as late as 3pm for delivery before 11pm.

A large amount of guesswork went into decisions about which products should be made each day. As many of the chilled products had a limited shelf life, mistakes could be costly and result in much wastage. Uniq needed a system that could eliminate this guesswork.

Essential areas in the factory, such as quality control and traceability, were controlled by unwieldy, slow, paper-based systems.

More reSPonSive to cuStoMer DeManDS Like the other Uniq companies, Uniq was reviewing its ways of working in order to reduce lead times, cut costs and become more responsive to customer demands.

Spalding said: “We looked at supply chain systems because of the business benefits, greater control and forecasting capabilities they offered. However, we knew we needed an MRP (Material Requirement Planning) system.

“We issued an invitation to tender to 12 big players in this area, whittled them down to five, and then to three. There was an intense amount of testing and checking, and we decided on Tropos unanimously. Solarsoft understood our business issues and showed how Tropos would help in all the key areas.

“Tropos was particularly strong on recipe management, which is at the core of MRP. And it was one of the few packages with strong support for the process industry, in which liquids flow through pipes and go in different directions according to customer demand.”

real-tiMe inforMation on Market neeDS Tropos provides Uniq with real-time information on changes in demand, which arrive via electronic data interchange (EDI). Information on products and ingredients is available at each stage of the manufacturing process so that changes in production schedules can be assessed immediately.

Tropos allows for simplified despatch routines, thus reducing delivery lead times, improving customer service levels and overall responsiveness.

Tropos triggers the production of invoices as soon as items are dispatched. The invoice information is fed into the company’s accounting systems and is despatched electronically to certain customers.

Visibility of the inventory, and the management of line-side stocks, ensures that stock levels are kept low while maintaining the smooth running of the production lines.

The first step in implementing the new system was to establish stock balances. Then, via a recipe module, lists of the correct ingredients for each product were set up.

Staff Soon coMPetent on neW SySteMAbout half of the Paignton factory’s staff needed training to use Tropos. According to Spalding, this went very smoothly. “The look and feel of Tropos seems to suit most of our factory workers,” he said. “They are tuned into it. Each person had two hours of training a week for as many weeks as it took; some had no computing experience at all. We put terminals on the shop floor early on so that staff could practise on them. The staff rapidly proved they were competent and accurate on the system.”

Uniq project manager Ian Kenworthy, said: “The system was easy to put in place and training took less time than we planned for originally. The staff understand the system and the role it plays in product traceability.”

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The ability to plan around critical resources, such as labour, enables measures to be taken to manage peak periods.

eaSy interface to other beSt-of-breeD aPPlicationS Uniq was already using a forecasting system and had implemented new financial systems to suit Group requirements in a best-of-breed approach. Tropos’s ability to interface easily to other systems and process control equipment was a benefit, as it gave the company the freedom to pick best-of-breed applications to fit other parts of the business.

Spalding explained: “As a product is moved around the factory, staff log activity information into the system so we always know where we are in the production process.

“If a machine breaks down, things can be rescheduled and a new plan implemented immediately. The Tropos system keeps track of any ingredient as soon as it arrives in the factory, and it can be tracked through the production process. Each production line can be monitored and the quantities of cream or fruit, for example, can be checked to see that customers get a consistent

product. And then each product can be tracked down through the cooling process and, as it goes to a lorry, for onward delivery to customers.”

SPeeDy reaction When ProbleMS are iDentifieDAccording to Spalding, one of the biggest benefits of Tropos is that factory staff can react more quickly when problems or errors are identified because the system will be quick to draw their attention to the problem. “You don’t want to find out you’ve over or under-filled trifles with custard after a whole day’s production,” he said. “With Tropos you can check much faster that the right things are happening.

“The system’s electronic logging means that, if we get an inquiry on the traceability of a product, we can find out in minutes. Before it could take days.

“We may need to know about a particular vat of custard and which products it has been used to make. If there’s an inquiry about quality, we can quickly work out where that custard ended up. Tropos gives us instant access to that information.”

Factory manager Stan Slater confirmed: “The system reduces management time in looking at problems. It also underpins our commitment to ISO 9002.”

ProDuct inforMation, an aDDitional cuStoMer ServiceTropos’s Resources and Processes module facilitates the cataloguing and dissemination of product information, such as its nutritional content, thus providing an additional customer service.

“Obviously health and cleanliness are a food manufacturer’s primary responsibility, and we have to be able to prove we have made our products to the right specification. We owe it to the consumers to do so,” said Spalding.

Another advantage of Tropos is that its Quality Management module, with its capabilities in tracing ingredients throughout the entire manufacturing process, dramatically reduces the need for paper. A daily schedule of about 150 batches that used to be in paper form is now on computer.

“Paper is a difficult medium to handle on the shop floor, but computers can be in that area in metal cabinets and can increase speed and efficiency,” said Spalding.

The Tropos system benefits the company as a whole because it is linked with head office and gives a much clearer picture of the production process. Spalding added: “It helps towards the purchase of common packaging, and the flow of raw materials into the factory can be much better controlled. And we’ve got more rapid awareness of product dispatch, which assists us in producing accurate invoices.”

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