Business Intelligence in Manufacturing Industry

"Changes start from knowing what you are actually doing"

The manufacturing industry is exposing to a more volatile and fragmented business environment than ever. To change or to die is the only option that they can do. But where to start and how to do it? From our point of view, it should start with the acknowledgement of operation processes of both internal and external environments. This post will shed some light on new challenges to manufacturing industry and solutions that BI can help to resolve it.

"Changes start from knowing what you are actually doing"

Manufacturing industry perhaps is one of the most complicated and complex industry in terms of operation and production management in the world. To maximise profits, many organisations try to simplify their systems, make it more sophisticated to reduce waste in production, waste of inventory, and waste of time. Eventually, to increase profits, companies need a solution that provides insights into their system and procedure which can help them achieve their goals.

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New challenges to manufacturing companies

• The complexity of suppliers and customers network.
• The priority of keeping production cost low.
• Controlling the operating costs-outsourced products.
• The quality of after sales services: installation, maintenance, repairs, replacement parts need a system to record, control, and follow.
• Combating declining profits and over-capacity and dealing with new technologies.
• Use information technology to manage supply chains, suppliers, distributors, and customers to increase operational efficiencies and reduce procurement costs.

The need of Business Intelligence Solutions at manufacturing companies

• Need of managing and utilising corporate data: tap into the huge databases and deliver easy-to-comprehend insight to improve business performance and maintain regulatory compliance.
• Manage large volumes of data from many sources, including suppliers, distributors, customers, inventory databases.
• Improve operational efficiency and keep costs down by analysing profit and loss, including products sales analysis, raw materials, supplier outlays and cost effectiveness of different distributors.

Business Intelligence in manufacturing industry

Financial management

• To improve profit margins a manufacturer must focus on both external profit building and internal cost reductions.
• Analyse information across multiple sources to set performance goals and create sophisticated profitability and financial models.
• Develop budgets that incorporate production, operation, sales, fulfillment, and finance figures for optimal forecasting and planning.

Inventory control

The biggest assets of a manufacturer is its inventory on hand of finished products, the second biggest assets its inventory on hand of replacement, spare, and refurbished parts. Therefore inventory analysis like the one above report is essential for managing costs and allocation.

• Track inventory usage across location and time, monitor inventory costs.
• Analyse information across multiple sources to set performance goals and create sophisticated profitability and financial models.
• Develop budgets that incorporate production, operation, sales, fulfillment, finance figures for optimal forecasting and planning.

Supply chain management

• Optimise the value of suppliers by giving them feedbacks on their services.
• Evaluate supplier performance on daily basis to better negotiate prices, ensure timely deliveries and maintain high standards of quality.
• Identify changes in supply and demand and monitor freight costs.

Cost management

• Allows in-depth cost analysis across multiple sources so that companies can track materials, manufacturing and production costs through multiple layers of information. 
• Companies can reduce overhead cost by analysing and monitoring operational efficiency and identifying areas where they can streamline processes and procedures.

Conclusion

The manufacturing industry is facing with the wind of change. Globalisation, new technologies, and serve competition are some reasons behind it. Organisations are seeking solutions to optimise their complex process, reduce costs and get more control of their own system. Information is the key to any problem as always we act on the information that is available to us. The most important value of Business Intelligence is that its ability to enable the management to KNOW exactly what they have to do in order to move their business forward.

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