Published on 30-May-2006
Validated on 16 Jul 2009
"With the new version of DB2 v8.2.2 optimized for SAP solutions, we are confident that we will benefit from a reduced administrative workload, with a stable system that delivers higher levels of performance and reliability. " - Herbert Langheinz, Systems Team Leader, Reiff Gruppe
Customer:
Reiff Gruppe
Industry:
Fabrication & Assembly, Industrial Products
Deployment country:
Germany
Solution:
Business Performance Transformation, Business Process Management (BPM), Enterprise Resource Planning, Optimizing IT
IBM Business Partner:
SAP
Overview
Reiff Gruppe was founded in Reutlingen, Germany in 1910 and has remained a family-run business. The company employs more than 1,300 people throughout Germany and Europe, with annual turnover of around €267 million.
Business need:
Reiff Gruppe, an automotive components manufacturer based in Germany, was looking for ways to integrate online sales with its manufacturing control system, and found it was limited by existing self-developed software and an older IT infrastructure.
Solution:
Reiff elected to implement SAP software including mySAP Customer Relationship Management (mySAP CRM) and mySAP Supply Chain Management (mySAP SCM). This would take Reiff out of the software development business and allow the team to focus on manufacturing efficiencies and customer service.
Benefits:
Reiff is able to ensure that customer orders placed online are reflected immediately in manufacturing systems. Sharing the same data allows Reiff to run lower stock levels, eliminate order-entry errors, and provide almost 100 per cent order fulfilment to customers.
Case Study
Reiff Gruppe was founded in Reutlingen, Germany in 1910 and has remained a family-run business since. The company employs more than 1,300 people throughout Germany and Europe, with annual turnover of around €267 million. The company has eight subsidiaries manufacturing automobile components, including over 95,000 products such as fan belts, pipes, hoses, sheets of plastic and other specialized automotive fittings.
In this internationalised market, Reiff found that its in-house developed ERP system was not delivering the integrated sales, product and manufacturing data that managers wanted. The green-screen terminals were seen as old-fashioned by users, and it was difficult and expensive to extend the system. Says Systems Team Leader Herbert Langheinz, “The self-developed ERP system was an ASCII screen-based function and had some limits in usability and functionality. We decided to offer a new ERP solution to the group’s companies in order to enhance functionality and future reliability.”
Putting the squeeze on inventory levels
Approximately 480 users at Reiff use SAP’s ERP software for financial control. The company planned to implement mySAP CRM and mySAP SCM solutions as the first steps in the transformation programme. By using integrated SAP applications, Reiff would be able to link customer orders directly through the supply chain to the manufacturing systems.
Using the technology, Reiff proposed to squeeze inventory levels, eliminate order-entry errors, and increase its customer order fulfilment percentages. These changes would allow Reiff to cut its operational costs – always essential in the cut-throat automotive business – and simultaneously hike its customer service and satisfaction.
The existing IT infrastructure at Reiff was drawing towards the end of its life, and the change to SAP software would undoubtedly require a system refresh.
A stable solution from IBM
Working with IBM Premier Business Partner Fritz & Macziol, Reiff chose to implement an IBM System p5 570 system with AIX 5.3 for its SAP software production systems, including the new SAP CRM solution, and an IBM System p5 520 as test, QA, failover and backup server. The System p5 servers will also handle the remaining self-developed applications, including the in-house human resources solution.
Fritz & Macziol provided detailed sizing and architecture advice, as well as the technical personnel for data migration during the crucial cutover period. Reiff chose IBM DB2 Universal Database and IBM Tivoli Storage Manager, managing a total of 1.5 TB of data. The database serves both the new SAP solutions and manufacturing control systems, enabling rapid, reliable data integration. IBM DB2 version 8.2.2 has been optimised for SAP solutions, designed to deliver increased scalability and availability while making it easier to install, configure and manage information.
“DB2 is a good database solution if you want to have a minimum of administration and a reliable database,” says Herbert Langheinz. “We had been using the Informix Dynamic Server database solution, which the newer versions of SAP solutions would not support. A stable solution is important for us and our experience of Informix has been good; we expect the same of DB2.”
Reiff has completed the migration of all its Informix and SAP solution data to DB2, a process that went smoothly. Herbert Langheinz comments, “With the new version of DB2 v8.2.2 optimized for SAP solutions, we are confident that we will benefit from a reduced administrative workload, with a stable system that delivers higher levels of performance and reliability.”
Three key drivers for SAP software
Herbert Langheinz notes that there were three distinct advantages for Reiff in selecting SAP software: “First, SAP was able to offer a Linux client for its SAP Java interface. By using this approach, we have been able to switch all our workstation computers to run Linux. This was for an estimated 350 users, saving a considerable sum in licence fees.
“Second, our previous experience with SAP’s financials and controlling applications was good. It was a logical step to simply extend the SAP solution with the ERP functionality. Last and not least, SAP is one of the largest companies around, and we feel confident that it will continue to offer us continuity and reliability of service for many years to come.”
Staying with IBM solutions
“We have been using IBM servers successfully for many years now. We decided to stay with IBM technologies because our experience with IBM has been positive, and we have confidence that this is a good choice for a reliable and scalable solution,” says Herbert Langheinz.
Building on solid foundations
Says Herbert Langheinz, “The transition to the new IBM System p5 servers running SAP software has been smooth and successful, and they have proved their worth in stability. We are now readying the company to go live with the new ERP functionality at the earliest opportunity.“What Reiff needed was to find a solution that would give us optimal reliability and performance, to enable our business plans for better information and the next stages in customer service; we have found that with IBM and SAP.”
Products and services used
IBM products and services that were used in this case study.
Hardware:
Storage: DS4000, System p, System p: eServer p5 520 Express, System p: eServer p5 570, System p: System p5 570
Software:
Tivoli Storage Manager, DB2 Data Servers, DB2 Universal Database for Linux, UNIX and Windows, DB2 for AIX
Operating system:
AIX, AIX 5L
Legal Information
IBM Deutschland GmbH D-70548 Stuttgart IBM, the IBM logo, IBM System z, IBM System p, IBM System i, IBM System x, z/OS, z/VM, i5/OS, AIX, DB2, DB2 Universal Database, Domino, Lotus, Tivoli, WebSphere and Enterprise Storage Server are trademarks of International Business Machines Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both. Intel, Intel logo, Intel Inside, Intel Inside logo, Intel Centrino, Intel Centrino logo, Celeron, Intel Xeon, Intel SpeedStep, Itanium, and Pentium are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries in the United States and other countries. UNIX is a registered trademark of The Open Group in the United States and other countries. Linux is a trademark of Linus Torvalds in the United States, other countries, or both. Microsoft, Windows, Windows NT, and the Windows logo are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both. Other company, product or service names may be trademarks, or service marks of others. This case study illustrates how one IBM customer uses IBM and/or IBM Business Partner technologies/services. Many factors have contributed to the results and benefits described. IBM does not guarantee comparable results. All information contained herein was provided by the featured customer and/or IBM Business Partner. IBM does not attest to its accuracy. All customer examples cited represent how some customers have used IBM products and the results they may have achieved. Actual environmental costs and performance characteristics will vary depending on individual customer configurations and conditions. This publication is for general guidance only. Photographs may show design models. © Copyright IBM Corp. 2006 All Rights Reserved.
