Glass

The business model and market structure of the glass industry, combined with some peculiarities of the process and production flows, make the management of planning processes particularly complex. The hollow glass market is in fact mainly controlled by large multinational companies, which have a multi-plant structure, with production facilities often run by distinct national companies. With a structure like this, inter-company orders to balance out workloads among the different companies and their production facilities are frequent.

A real case…

A client in the Glass industry successfully implemented a project based on the following requirements: Sales forecasts can be updated at set time intervals and are displayed with a configurable hierarchy; they can also be managed/edited with a Bottom Up and Top Down approach from any level/criteria. Passing through a collaborative level, Demand Planners validate sales forecasts at finite capacity, applying in all countries of the company planning methods at the S&OP (Sales and Operation Planning) and the MPS (Master Production Schedule) level.

Forecasting activities for commercial demand are therefore essential in this field , as is the proper planning of colour campaigns and furnace maintenance campaigns, so as to create the right context to effectively balance logistic activities and capacity among the different assets.
The sedApta solution provides modules supporting both strategic planning and the planning of operational activities, thanks to components common to both activities, thus ensuring the same operability and consistency of data in every stage of the planning process.
Some of the most important multinational companies in the glass industry implemented the sedApta Glass Solution to cover the entire planning process, including the management of suppliers and third party operations. Communication and synchronisation among Divisions and Departments was greatly improved by means of the sedApta OSA approach.

The implemented solution allowed the customer to get the following benefits:

• Improved quality of customer service
• Planning methods at the S&OP (Sales and Operation Planning) and the MPS (Master Production Schedule) level applied in all countries, while reconsidering the quality of the demand
• Improved forecast quality in the short and medium term and stabilised production programs
• Improved visibility of demand coverage at the S&OP level and ability to take the necessary trade-offs quite early
• Definition of the “Production Wheel” and improved reactivity of the factories (increased number of job changes)
• Optimised MPS / Scheduling interaction and collaboration.
• Weekly SFS (Shop Floor Scheduling) at finished product, responding to the demand coverage in the first place (vs. industrial optimisation)
• Increased simulation capabilities, level of service and faster decision process timeline
• Operation and collaboration optimisation and synchronisation

The sedApta solutions offers you:
Demand Planning: Both strategic planning and budgeting, and operational planning greatly benefited from the introduction of sedApta Glass Solution. Commercial budget process took advantage of the collaborative top-down and bottom-up approach of sedApta  Demand Management  modules. Collaborative Sales for Demand Planning and Management are available too.

Inventory Planning: What if multi-scenario simulations, featured in sedApta Inventory Control and Resource & Supply Planning modules, reduced the time needed to create and analyse scenarios from weeks to a few days.

Production Planning: In the operational planning process it’s possible to cope with all critical constraints in the glass container process, such as colour campaigns, pulled tons limits and mould changes with real-time assessment of production plan versions. Integrated Inventory Management and Resource and Supply Planning for infinite and finite capacity planning.

Scheduling and MES: Optimised production sequencing. Management of maintenance interventions allow for the typology of breakdowns by equipment and their solutions to be obtained. Ease of use of the consoles for operators: offers a direct and real-time view of the various line status indicators with the provision of homogeneous, real-time dashboards, regardless of the production site, for management.

Road transportation planning and tracking: plan your Shipment, starting with Order Lines or Deliveries sent by ERP; select Optimal Carriers, comparing Agreements or Spot Quotations, and Evaluate your Shipments.
Check Technical Capabilities calculated by NextRoute and mapped by each Service Provider; manage Bookings and Check-In through a Collaborative Process.

The benefits of the sedApta solution can be summarised as follows:

• Improved efficiency of the Supply Chain, including the management of subcontractors.
• Improved collaboration among the corporate functions involved in the Supply Chain
• Optimisation and synchronisation of planning and manufacturing activities
• Improved supplier management and delivery reliability
• Quick reaction to unplanned events and acceleration in the decision-making process
• Total and complete full-service integration with SAP