Then it was time for the implementation. "We had decided not to carry out a data migration - there was simply too much data in the old program for that," explains Thomas Carta. Over several weekends, S&B employees entered the parts list data of all parts and products into the new system according to previously defined specifications. Carta only kept the numbers, "because this is a semi-linguistic key that is very important to us." Of the total of 25,000 articles, 8,000 have already been created in Sage X3 and will continue to be entered successively as soon as a new order variant is available. "The fact that we are now far better positioned than before with the new software in the area of parts lists for design, scheduling and procurement is a huge step forward for us," emphasizes the company boss.

Today, when an S&B employee executes the "Reserve order XY" function in Sage X3, he immediately receives an overview of the necessary parts in the warehouse and the required repeat orders. Using the data on the forecast goods receipt, the working times on which the production machines are based and the personnel utilization, the mechanical engineering specialist can predict the delivery date relatively accurately. The price of the machine can be determined just as easily.

This system-based calculation was another important goal that Thomas Carta pursued with the new company software. Previously, due to the insufficiently transparent parts lists in the old system, the figures - such as purchased parts, working hours and overheads - were recorded in an Excel spreadsheet and then laboriously reworked. These intermediate steps are now a thing of the past. Thomas Carta: "It is very useful when all the data is available. We can see very quickly where the price or costs lie." However, if no production or purchase prices have yet been entered, Sage X3 explicitly draws attention to this and thus prevents miscalculations.

Invoicing derived from production order

Of course, an automatic transition between the production software and financial accounting was also to be created so that invoicing could be derived directly from the production order and completion. Carta played it safe here and ran its old financial accounting software in parallel with the new one for around nine months. "It was a relatively time-consuming process, but we were able to compare the figures and identify where we had made mistakes in order to optimize the software," explains the company boss. Since July 1, 2017, only Sage X3 financial accounting has been running.

In the near future, Thomas Carta also plans to integrate another Sage X3 functionality, Customer Relationship Management (CRM). S&B sales and service employees will then also be able to use the benefits of Sage X3 while on the move. They will then be able to check which parts are in stock or when the customer can expect an estimated delivery date, for example. As Sage X3 also works on mobile devices with iOS and Android, the employee can call up the required information and data at any time.

"The Sage employees really went the extra mile - both in recording our complex production situation and in finding the best solution," concludes Thomas Carta. "As a result, we have managed to cover 90 percent of our order variants." Gabi Visintin/cs