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Founded in 1885, Boehringer-ingelheim (Germany)
International Group is one of the biggest family-owned
pharmaceutical companies worldwide. Operating in
over 140 subsidiaries and having several R&D
centers overseas, the company invests heavily in
R&D, and manufactures human pharmaceuticals such
as Actilyse®, Mucosolvan® and Mobic®, as well as
animal health products. Actilyse® is thrombolytic
treatment in acute myocardial infarction, and
Mucosolvan® dissolves and expels chesty phlegm,
and Mobic® is a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory
drug indicated for symptomatic treatment of
painful osteoarthritis (arthrosis, degenerative
joint disease).
Boehringer-Ingelheim came to China and opened an
office in Shanghai in March 1994, and established
Boehringer-Ingelheim International Trade (Shanghai)
Co., Ltd. in Wai Gao Qiao Bond in May 1995. Early
1998, Boehringer-Ingelheim moved to Chinese Pharma
Valley – Shanghai Pudong Zhangjiang HighTech Zone,
and jointly founded Shanghai Boehringer-Ingelheim
Pharmaceuticals Co. Ltd. The factory went live in
March 2002, and is expected to produce 150 million
pieces of troche, 6.2 million bottles of aerosol,
10 million bottles of solution and 1.17 million
UDV.
The right ERP solution
In 2000, the annual revenue of Boehringer-Ingelheim
Shanghai Company was RMB180 million, and it is
expected to increase to RMB600 million by 2006.
“Scala’s collaborative ERP solution is the right
choice for us in terms of business volume. As
Scala always says, it is the right package for
small and middle enterprises,” said Mr. Chen
Jingwei, IT Manager for Boehringer-Ingelheim
Shanghai Company.
In May 2000, Boehringer-Ingelheim Shanghai placed
the order with Scala Business Solutions to
implement Scala’s traditional ERP system for the
pharmaceutical industry, Scala Pharma (including
General Ledger, Fixed Assets, Sales Ledger,
Purchase Ledger and Manufacturing), based on the
Microsoft SQL Server database.
Divergence and concession
During the Business Requirements Review, Scala
consultants advised the company to implement the
system in a particular order, starting with the
financials and finishing with the manufacturing
modules, but Boehringer-Ingelheim Shanghai had a
different opinion. They wanted to install the
manufacturing processes before the logistics
modules, because they had seen how quickly their
domestic business was growing and they were facing
a national health care reform. These factors were
drivers behind the company’s plans to be well
prepared for future sales and the increasing
supply chain, which meant that the manufacturing
processes were more important than the logistics.
On the other hand, Scala’s stock control processes
are closely linked with manufacturing. The Scala
implementation consultants worked hard to satisfy
the company’s need of manufacturing, logistics and
Pharma functionality, thus making the daily
practices easier and helping the company comply
with GMP regulations.
For years before implementing Scala, Boehringer-Ingelheim
Shanghai used a local financial software package.
However, that financial software package alone did
not meet the growing business requirements. The IT
department’s top priority therefore became the
need to change business platform.
“When we first started using Scala, many of our
employees had no idea of what an ERP system was,
and they were used to the established processes,”
explained Jingwei. “They were not familiar with an
integrated system, and they felt it was difficult
to master the rich functionality in the Scala
system. This is not unusual for new ERP users.
Because Scala consultants conducted a high-quality
business review, coupled with the outstanding
report building tools that came with Scala,
Boehringer-Ingelheim employees easily changed over
to the new system in the end, and they were able
to get familiar with and adapt to Scala in a very
short period of time."
Jingwei continued, “Meanwhile, Scala designed
various reports for us. Now, our staff has
realized that they have benefited from the new
system in their daily business. Scala’s financial
reporting satisfies all our financial needs, and
enables people throughout the company to access
real time back-office information and they can
generate reports based on the latest data to
manage accounting, purchase and stock processes
more efficiently.”
Benefits from the successful implementation
Although Boehringer-Ingelheim Shanghai has not yet
implemented all the functionality in Scala,
Jingwei has been impressed by Scala's financial
and logistic modules. He commented, “Scala’s
flexibility, functionality and stability is
unbeatable. It provides 80 per cent of the
functionality we required, and the other 20
percent can be met by best-of-breed products from
third parties or developed by purpose-built tools.
Scala has an open architecture and is user-friendly,
which makes it easy for the user to export data
and generate customized forms and reports
according to their needs.”
Commenting on Scala’s security Jingwei added, “In
addition, Scala is powered by Microsoft SQL
Server, which means that Scala only need to
develop its own application program. Customers can
therefore also benefit from system improvements
when Microsoft upgrades their SQL Server, without
having to upgrade Scala. On the other hand, the
system's security can be ensured by an integrated
LAN user authentication system, thus further
minimizing the implementation risk. From this
point of view, we have found that Scala is highly
secure.”
Boehringer-Ingelheim Shanghai has gained
measurable benefits such as shortening the goods
import turnaround time, by adopting Scala. In the
past, the company had to submit product import
proposals to their Germany headquarters a year in
advance, now they can receive products within 3
months of notifying headquarters, thereby reducing
cost, improving efficiency and enhancing their
competitive advantage because they can get their
products to the market quicker |
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