Parmalat implements performance monitoring BI tools to give management high level view of business

Parmalat South Africa - the country's second largest dairy company - has expanded its industry-leading use of business intelligence (BI) solutions with the implementation of a new tool that gives top management an at-a-glance view of how different aspects of the business are performing against pre-set goals.

The company, which has seven plants, 13 distribution centres and 8 distribution agents throughout SA, has bought Cognos' latest BI tool, KPI (Key Performance Indicator) Business Pack, from business intelligence specialist, Synergy Computing.

"We've been long-time users of Cognos's PowerPlay multi-dimensional BI tools producing a myriad of reports, but we needed something that would give our director-level and senior managers a high level overview of business performance," says Hannes Germishuys, MIS manager of Parmalat. "The information is already there in other reports, but, especially when it comes to looking at ERP data, you don't want to go to 17 different reports to find out some key data. Managers haven't got the time nor patience to do this. They want to be able to see what's happening at a glance."

By getting a quick, high level view of how business or individual performances are tracking relative to set goals, managers are able to initiate pro-active decisions or ensure operational managers investigate and resolve any problems highlighted by drilling down into the data to identify the cause.

"KPI Business Pack is an accelerated way to find out what's going on - from the shop floor to executive levels. And once problem areas are highlighted, managers immediately know where they need to focus their attention," says Christo Bredenkamp, Account Manager, Synergy Computing.

Synergy, which is a Cognos SA partner and a leading BI and datawarehousing solutions specialist, was responsible for implementing the software and setting up the initial measures required by Parmalat.

"After applying the initial measures to get the managers up and running quickly, we did two days user training and skills transfer to ensure they could add their own indicators in future, as required. It's very user friendly software and setting up these performance indicators is very simple," says Bredenkamp.

Staff at Parmalat have been Congos PowerPlay users for more than seven years. The company moved to the Web version of PowerPlay in 1999 and increased its number of users to 65 when KPI Business Pack was implemented.

In addition it has 10 power users, working on the client version setting up complex reports and data cubes and carrying out in-depth 'number-crunching' analyses.

"PowerPlay is a very powerful BI tool and we have always used it extensively especially when the Web version was introduced. Now there's no need to have data dictionaries and cubes reproduced all over the country at our different branches. Everything is controlled centrally and all our users have easy Internet access to up-to-the-minute business information and reports," says Germishuys.

Using PowerPlay, Parmalat is able to view individual customer profitability against budget, location right down to product item level as well as get key insight into all aspects of its business including its Human Resources operations.

"I believe the type of information we are able to provide our business is way ahead of other suppliers in our industry. We have people joining us from major national food companies, who are amazed at the information they can get, concludes Germishuys.

Parmalat entered the South African market in 1998 with the acquisition of prominent South African dairy companies, Towerkop and Bonnita. Parmalat SA with its headquarters in Stellenbosch near Cape Town has apart from its South African operations, extensive production and distribution facilities in Swaziland, Mozambique and Zambia. It has also established a distribution infrastructure in Botswana making the company well positioned as a strong player within the Southern African dairy industry.