Rexam extends Cognos reporting, visualisation across the business

Rexam Beverage Can Americas, a division of global consumer packaging giant Rexam, has implemented a business intelligence (BI) solution from Cognos, to provide reporting and analysis capabilities across the enterprise, strengthen customer relationships and to better manage corporate performance.

Rexam is the world`s largest beverage-can manufacturer and a supplier to major soft drink and beer companies worldwide. Employees at Rexam are using Cognos BI solutions, Impromptu Web Reports and PowerPlay to analyse and report on critical data for inventory, production, human resources, and quality control.

Managers use PowerPlay`s powerful drill-down capabilities to compare customer-to-customer, quarter-to-quarter, or product-to-product, enabling Rexam to quickly spot trends and take required action. Rexam also implemented, Cognos Visualizer, which conveys this highly complex information to managers and executives in a dashboard view.

"From quality control, to defective products, to inventory management, managers now have the ability to pinpoint problems and react quickly to the needs of the customers," says Matt McDonald, project manager of BI and e-commerce at Rexam.

"The Cognos business intelligence solution is extremely powerful and allows Rexam to use data easily and more effectively. Employees are empowered to create and distribute their own reports, significantly easing the burden on IT resources - with Cognos we are saving thousands of work-hours each year, previously spent on report creation," he says.

Recognising the value of this data, Rexam is now pushing the data out to its customers via an extranet. The Web-based system allows Rexam customers to access account and invoice reports online, as well as place and update orders. This system will allow Rexam to improve speed and accuracy of its deliveries as well as eliminate the onerous paper-based reporting previously required.

"This is a perfect example of where IT is delivering exceptional value to customers and our employees," says McDonald. "We are redefining and e-enabling our businesses processes with an end result of redefining world-class in our industry. The Cognos products are helping us get there."

"Rexam has seen the benefits of the Cognos solution through faster, easy access to information and the ability for executives to use that information to better manage corporate performance. Using Cognos BI, Rexam is able to unite disparate data sources to gain a comprehensive view of operations across the total enterprise," explains Dave Laverty, senior vice president, global marketing at Cognos.

"Cognos enables companies to gain the insight they need to identify trends, spot problem areas, and make the fast, informed business decisions that make an impact when and where it matters most," concludes Laverty.