The challenge? It could be difficult for others to access the information and then leverage it to guide decisions. Many of the company’s information systems had been built in-house several decades ago. Not only were they outdated, but they often failed to provide the information Etnyre management needed to move the business forward. “At the end of each month and the end of each quarter, we would kill lots of trees,” Nelson says. “We’d create tons of paper reports.”
enterprise resource planning systems (ERPs) and customer relationship management systems (CRMs), as well as in peripheral smaller systems like warehouse and inventory applications, or Access databases or spreadsheets. Traditionally, these systems haven’t been easily connected. “Tada sat on top of the whole ecosystem and connected the dots,” Nelson says.
communication across disparate systems, such as inventory, financial, and warehouse management solutions. “It brings together complicated systems under one roof,” says Rohan Parambi, senior director for business and product development at Tada. As a result, information flows between the systems. To accomplish this, the Tada solution connects directly to source data in primary repositories like
OUTDATED, TRANSACTIONAL INFORMATION Along with the impact to the
environment, the information contained in the reports often was outdated. “We could see only what happened three weeks ago,” Nelson says. Moreover, the reports contained transactional information, detailing what products had been bought and sold, but didn’t provide “good, actionable intelligence,” like visibility to emerging trends, which could help management make more informed decisions, Nelson says. In addition, information was scattered across multiple systems. For instance, quotes were in one system and sales orders in another. Because the solutions weren’t integrated, anyone searching for both types of information had to log into each system separately. Then came the pandemic and its accompanying challenges, including labor shortages and supply chain upheaval. The result was “the perfect storm,” Nelson says. It was time to change how Etnyre managed the information it generated, so leadership could better leverage it to drive growth. That would require integrating information from multiple systems and ensuring it was both accurate and easily available. CONNECTING SYSTEMS To meet this goal, Etnyre turned to Tada, whose name is an anagram for “data.” Tada’s Digital Duplicate technology forms a layer that enables
When Etnyre decided to move from making decisions based on opinions and tribal knowledge to decisions based on facts and data, it partnered with Tada Cognitive Solutions.
CASEBOOK STUDY Seeing Double THE CHALLENGES
E.D. Etnyre, which produces maintenance equipment for asphalt roads under several brands, including Etnyre and BearCat Manufacturing, lacked timely visibility to its operations and sales data, as well as to its suppliers’ performance. Transaction information was scattered across multiple systems and retained by employees as tribal knowledge, making it difficult to access and bring together. THE SOLUTION Digital Duplicate technology from Tada Cognitive Solutions forms a layer that facilitates communication across disparate systems, including inventory, financial, and warehouse management solutions, among others. THE RESULTS Etnyre gained in-depth, timely information to its own and its suppliers’ performance. Implementing the Tada solution also helped to break down internal siloes to foster more collaboration. In addition, Etnyre has been able to more accurately assess the profitability of its multiple product lines and determine where to allocate resources. NEXT STEPS Etnyre plans to expand its application of the Tada technology, although the schedule is yet to be determined.
56 Inbound Logistics • October 2022
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