Scala Africa has announced that Cognis, a worldwide supplier of specialty chemicals and nutritional ingredients, has signed an order for the iScala collaborative ERP system to support financial and logistic management in its subsidiaries in Poland, Russia and SA.
In addition to the software licences worth over R1 million, the order includes consulting services and maintenance.
According to Brian Hoey, managing director of Cognis South Africa, Cognis SA is replacing its SAP ERP solution with the iScala system, but retaining SAP at its head office in Germany.
"Cognis was sold off from its parent company some two years ago. We had inherited our ERP system from that company, but found that the economies of scale made the system costly to run while it was also unnecessarily intricate for our business requirements," he says.
Because business automation should never add complexity, the company selected the iScala collaborative system as a replacement that would deliver the full functionality it requires without a lengthy deployment cycle or onerous retraining of staff.
"The iScala solution suited our needs ideally, with a highly structured implementation methodology that provides project planning and feedback to map our business needs to the information systems," says Hoey.
He adds that Scala Africa's consultants have demonstrated a thorough understanding of the Cognis' business requirements. "Through the process of scoping and implementing the system, we have actually begun to understand our business better ourselves, which is providing further opportunities for improvements in efficiency," he says.
Kai Finke, Director of Information Technology North Europe, for Cognis, says Scala's proven success in the pharmaceutical industries played a significant part in the selection of the platform. "Scala's references and its experience on the chemical market were factors that had a substantial impact on our decision," he explains.
The main objective of the implementation is to establish a common ERP solution to support Cognis' operational business needs, combined with meeting corporate reporting requirements, says Shamik Sinha, CEO of Scala Africa. "The key benefits of this solution include improved control of logistic processes, finance and accounting, uniform reporting and a lower total cost of ownership for the system," he says.
Other factors involved in Cognis' decision to choose Scala were advanced ERP functionality, clear and easy reporting, system architecture, and its multi-language and multi-currency capabilities.
Sinha says the deal with Cognis is another example of a two-tiered ERP strategy.
"Global companies find that running and integrating Scala in their worldwide subsidiaries with SAP in their headquarters delivers a seamless enterprise-wide solution," he says.
"Because Scala can be implemented much quicker than a large ERP system such as SAP and it still includes all the necessary functionality, companies can achieve a significantly lower total cost of ownership than if they were to run just one large ERP solution across all their units."
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Cognis (www.cognis.com) is a worldwide supplier of innovative specialty chemicals and nutritional ingredients and has almost 9 000 employees in close to 50 countries. The company has dedicated its activities to a high level of sustainability and delivers natural-source raw materials and ingredients for food, nutrition and healthcare markets, and the cosmetics, detergents and cleaners industries. Additionally, Cognis provides solutions for a number of other industries such as coatings and inks, lubricants, textiles and plastics as well as agriculture and mining.
Cognis is owned by private equity funds advised by Permira, GS Capital Partners, and Schroder Ventures Life Sciences. In 2002, Cognis recorded sales of 3.1 billion euros and an operating profit before depreciation, amortisation and exceptional items (EBITDA) of 393 million euros. A turnover of 748.6 million euros was achieved in the first three months of 2003.
Scala Africa
Scala Business Solutions is represented in Africa and the Indian Ocean Islands by Scala Africa, which provides sales, consulting and implementation skills to a customer base of 70 companies in SA and a further 300 in the rest of Africa and the Indian Ocean Islands. Headquartered in Johannesburg and with offices in countries including Kenya, Uganda and Nigeria, Scala Africa, is a truly pan-African concern that offers integrated, collaborative ERP solutions to businesses across the continent. Visit Scala's Web site at www.scala.co.za for press information including press releases, information and product information.
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