2005 Articles
October 03, 2005
Supply Chain Systems Magazine - 2005 Supply Chain Innovators Awards
Supply Chain Systems Magazine
End User Company: Avaya
Business: Communications systems, applications, and services provider.
Key Tech Provider: Servigistics
As a company formed from acquisitions, Avaya’s service business consisted of separate operating entities. Not only were their global regions separate, but their various business lines (voice and data) were also separate operational groups. As a result, Avaya not only had different entities within its organization competing for the same inventory to service customers, each entity had its own information technology system, causing further disconnect and conflicting goals within their service parts organization.
Avaya selected and implemented Servigistics Service Parts Management Solution, version 7.7. Within the first six months after implementation, Avaya experienced the following results: identified more than 30 percent excess inventory in both central and field; reduced inventory 10 percent in central and field with additional scrap out by March 2005; avoided $5M in service parts repair costs; improved first-time fill rates by more than 30 percent; minimized penalties realized for missed SLA (Service Level Agreements); reduced broken tickets (technician issued to client site more then once); increased material fill rate to better than 95 percent target; decreased total material backorders to below 500; and now uses “next flight out” for less than 5 percent of all service material.
For our Supply Chain Innovators 2005 program, Supply Chain Systems magazine sent out requests for nominations through our weekly electronic newsletter, Supply Chain NewsLink, and through email requests. We looked for companies that successfully implemented supply chain management software and hardware, as well as changes in company processes. Each nomination was required to include a list of user contacts and benefits achieved, some of which were provided on a confidential basis. Case studies published in the magazine from late 2004 through August 2005 were also reviewed. The nominations were reviewed by several analysts at Boston-based AMR Research, and then voted on by Supply Chain Systems magazine editors. Each editor was allowed to give a submission a vote of 1 to 10, with 10 being the most innovative, and 1 the least. The companies that received the highest number of votes (there were 34 nominations overall) are highlighted in this article.