Developing fully Operational Ports and Terminals

Developing fully Operational Ports and Terminals

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Following were the business Challenges and Opportunities while going through the project:

-The existing ERP was unable to support business processes

-Heavy use of Manual Processes during operational flow of the port due to which there were high level errors and weak process integration

-Primarily Excel based Planning of Preventive Maintenance Schedule was being practiced

-There was no single view of operation, and hence business Critical Processes were not automated due to which financial closure was slow and unreliable

-The instability in the user community against management, Inefficiency and errors where pretty evident. Which resulted in high cost due to un-optimized utilization of resources

 

Application Area were:

-IFS 7.5 SP2

-Enterprise Asset Maintenance

-Team of 4 members were involved in this project

Ports and Terminals

Following were business benefits, once the problems were overcome:

-There would be streamlined and painless operations

-Implementation of Trusted system would result in satisfied users

-There would be massive reduction in maintenance costs since there would be 100% elimination of manual work orders

-Single view of the organization in one system would be maintained which would result in timely and smooth periodic Financial closure

-Analytics reports would be available to all key users and hence this would help in easy roll-up in global structure with standard definition

-99% accuracy in Inventory

 

Contribution by Envecon:

-Pre-Study and solutioning definitions were framed in line with Expected Global Standard Processes

-Extensive User Training were carried out

-Data Migration was done through standard templates which led to a hassle free operation process

-Equipment Structures were designed as per Normalized Global Object Structures

-There were succesful User Acceptance Test

-And there were Cut-over and Go-live and Post Go-Live Support

What value does Commercial Business Intelligence brings in Ports and Terminals

What value does Commercial Business Intelligence brings in Ports and Terminals

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With intense pressure on Margins and increasing competition, Commercial team needs to keep close watch on their numbers. Numbers need to be accurate and in real time. Numbers need to be available 24×7 and should be accessible from anywhere and on any device.  Numbers like Target Verses Actual, Year To Date Performance, Business Mix of Imports, Exports, Domestics and Transshipments are very close to heart to any Commercial Manager.

 

Commercial organizations in Ports and Terminals have moved beyond the spreadsheets and now rely more on analytic tools to get visibility on facts from historical and real-time processing of online data. Business Intelligence in commercial organization is important as it gives visibility on which direction the business is moving and when and what decisions to be taken. 

 

Business Intelligence for commercials gives insights from multiple source of data in a single screen. While Commercial Dashboards provides a good visual representation of facts and help you stay connected with the numbers on a day to day basis, there are other tools like cubes and reports that helps you analyze data to the last level and assist you to drive change and improvement. 

 

KPI can be driven on facts in real-time basis by linking Commercial BI with KPI Management, adding more consistency and accuracy in performance management.

 

 Feel free to give us your feedback and drop in an email at sales@enveconit.com. Connect with us on Linkedin  

BI for Enterprise Asset Management

BI for Enterprise Asset Management

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Ports and terminals around the world face the challenge of reducing equipment and labor costs, managing growth without large capital investments in land and berth space and developing new technology.

 

Various managers need to make profitable decisions like accurately quantifying and locating assets for financial planning and procurement of replacement orders, maintenance contracts etc.

 

Business Intelligence (BI) addresses all the challenges, through comprehensive indicator analysis on equipment management & maintenance. Each department’s equipment inventory status and operability information is available, which is helpful for equipment allocation planning and improving work efficiency.

 

BI is a state of the art Business Intelligence tool that provides a powerful tool to analyze the port and terminal performance. Port and Terminal Productivity deals with the efficient use of labor, equipment, and land. BI provides powerful means to measure the efficiency of the use of these three resources.

 

These measures can be divided into production, productivity, utilization and service measures. BI utilizes integrated data from Terminal Operating System (like NAVIS) and ERP and uses graphically rich data visualization tools  like  dashboards and cubes features to clearly and accurately illustrate the business results and facilitates root cause and impact analysis

 

Benefits achieved  :

  • Increasing the reliability and availability of assets and the services the assets collectively support thus heeling  to reduce lost revenue due to asset failure.
  • Improving performance of assets to impact the top and bottom lines for example: timely vehicle maintenance to reduce costly fuel consumption.
  • Capturing actual cost for labor, materials, tools and services which helps to improve bottom line.
  • Standardizing & enforcing business processes thus supporting regulatory requirements to document and test business processes while improving efficiency and consistency of work force activities.

 

The end result for asset managers is the begin point for CFO’s and Department Heads. Taking the assets we know about and planning for the future life cycle of these assets is critical in running a successful, safe and profitable organization.

 

Feel free to connect with us on LinkedIn and check out our Case Studies too.

 

Enterprise Asset Management for Ports and Terminals

Enterprise Asset Management for Ports and Terminals

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Enterprise Asset Management (EAM) Solutions, helps in gaining real time visibility into asset usage, better govern assets, manage asset lifecycle, measure and manage energy consumption and improve your return on assets.

The benefits of Enterprise Asset Management are compelling:

* Reduce maintenance costs

* Reduce production costs

* Reduce labor costs

* Increase maintenance productivity

* Help improve your enterprise asset maintenance practices

* Help you comply with applicable regulations

* Minimize equipment breakdowns

* Minimize downtime

Enterprise Asset Management should have well defined ERP processes within itself to fully manage the life cycle of asset and should provide integrated processes in Finance, Procurement, Inventory and Project.

PLAN: Align Asset Acquisitions to corporate strategy. Link each Asset to the organizational budget and Revenue to be realized.

 

ACQUIRE: Negotiate agreements to maximize value. Huge assets that have longer cycle should be defined as projects, thus managing capitalization with a structured approach and control.

 

OPERATE: Track Asset Utilization by capturing its Efficiency, Uptime, Downtime and its contribution to the “No of Moves per Hour “and the Overall TEUs achieved. Thus in turn tracking and stream lining your return on investments.

 

MANAGE: Implement support infrastructure and process to enhance productivity and satisfaction. Establishing a seamless communication between Operations and Maintenance, for Equipment Availability and Optimized Performance is the key to enabling higher productivity.

 

RETIRE: Analyze the useful life of an Asset by establishing a consolidated view of Assets Current Value, Annual Maintenance Costs and its Performance. Any asset that has an increased liability should be retired, by comparing it with the Replacement Costs.

 

Enterprise Asset Management in Ports and Terminal, provide uniformity and ease of use across the asset groups and maintenance locations, thus creating efficiencies and reducing operating costs. Port Authority can use the this solution to meet or exceed goals and requirements of this initiative.

 

EAM, optimize the work flows, funding allocations, and resource utilization resulting in enhanced organizational transparency that facilitates accurate and agile capital planning. This assists Port Authority with better decision making based upon quality information.

 

Feel free to connect with us on LinkedIn  and check out our Case Studies too.

 

Why Business Intelligence is relevant in the Ports and Terminals business

Why Business Intelligence is relevant in the Ports and Terminals business

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Container Terminals generate a lot of container movements related data through the Terminal Operating Systems (TOS) and this data is captured the TOS database. Each move of container is a cost for terminal however the TOS does not have information related to cost.

Now, there are ERP systems like SAP, IFS, Microsoft Dynamics and many others which are used in Terminals to manage the functions of Finance, Procurement, Inventory, Enterprise Asset Management (EAM), Human Resources etc. These systems capture all information related to cost, assets, resources etc. but these systems do not have information related to container movements.

Then there are Workforce Management Systems used in most terminals that keeps track of workforce time and attendance, shift planning etc. but these systems do not have movements and cost related information.

With all the wealth of information in the form of Data available in various systems within the reach of terminals, it is still a very difficult process for terminals to get the relevant information by bring all these data together from these various systems for basic analysis, Dashboards and reporting.

Few simple questions on very high level that comes to mind are:

What is my cost per move ?

What is my workforce utilization per vessel or per box

How do I optimize my asset utilization ?

We think a simple and easy to use Business Intelligence solution is the answer to this need of every terminal. There are many business intelligence tools available in the market that can meet this requirement.

Beware that such project can take a very long period to see light if you do not define your business requirements first. We personally believe that 60 to 90 days would be ideal time for a Terminal to build a Business Intelligence solution.

What do you think about the use of Business Intelligence in Ports and Terminals. Feel free to drop in an email at sales@enveconit.com

or

Connect with us on Linkedin @ http://www.linkedin.com/company/envecon-it-systems-private-limited

 

Integrating TOS and ERP with Business Intelligence

Integrating TOS and ERP with Business Intelligence (BI) Solution for timely decision making

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With the dynamic operations in Port industry, from the top management till the staff need right information to perform their jobs efficiently.
With increase in the volume of business and also due to unpredictable circumstances, it becomes difficult for the management to make Right decisions at Right time. When employees have access to the most accurate information at the time they need it, they are able to make timelier and better informed decisions. And as the quality of decisions improves, the business realizes improved operational results. Business Intelligence Solution help you consolidate data from different source- TOS, ERP or any application that you are using and provides you a better analytical report for precise decision making.

Many decision makers have to hold onto decision making process to get the right data from their subordinates which is a time consuming process at times.
Enabler BI- is a state of the art Business Intelligence solution based on proven Microsoft Technologies. Enabler BI provides stunning Dashboards and Cubes that integrates seamlessly with your existing TOS and ERP solutions, thus helping you for a quick and easy strategic decision making process.
This browser based BI helps you with a one click Cube reports at your fingertips. Its drill down feature helps management to drill down to the lowest level, monitor the minute details and helps them in talking right decisions.
Benefits of Business Intelligence in your day to day operations include:
* Lower IT dependability for getting required data. You may create your own reports as and when you need it
* No maintaining data in different spreadsheets
* Identify your business trends, Identify your most profitable customer
* Monitor your Yard operations, Berth operations just by a single click.
* Create your own reports.