Warehouse employees can now quickly and efficiently check the stock position.
Vredestein Banden's strategy is crystal clear: producing tyres with the optimal price-quality ratio. This demands an organisation that functions well and in which all aspects of business management are maximised with respect to each other. The hyper-modern production facility in Enschede plays a crucial role in this. Production runs here 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. To guarantee minimum machine downtime, Vredestein maintains an extensive warehouse of spare parts. A stock control application ensures fitters do not get the wrong part. To optimise stock control, Inter Access has made the existing System i system based on IBM WebSphere accessible via a remote scanner.
Vredestein Banden B.V. has been developing, producing and selling high-quality tyres for private cars, commercial vehicles, bicycles and agricultural and industrial applications since 1909. The company has branches in thirteen European countries and in the United States. Its 1,200 employees ensure Vredestein sells a good ten million tyres every year. Through cooperation agreements with partners in Malaysia, Indonesia, India and Thailand, the company also has a foothold in the Far East.
Jos Wesselink, Automation Manager at Vredestein Banden: "As we are in continuous production in Enschede, it’s crucial we know for sure that we always have a minimum number of spare parts available. However, the result of this is that we manage an inventory valued at €5 million. To be sure our stock is optimal and up-to-date, and that we have the costs under control as far as possible, we have recently introduced a remote hand scanner into the warehouse. However, this plan did require a modification to the existing stock control application."
Wesselink: "During a general workshop Inter Access told us about the possibilities of modernising System i applications through the use of portal technology. A significant feature of this was that opening and providing access to these applications was possible without intensive programming work." When Vredestein wished to optimise the stock control of spare parts, the existing system possessed limitations. "Our stock control application is a standard solution on IBM's System i, the previous iSeries. We didn’t have the source code for it, so adapting it would have been tricky. As a result, the stocktaking function isn’t suitable for use by someone with no knowledge of the application. Plus, the fact that the application employs the familiar character-based 'green screens' didn’t help its usability." When Vredestein presented the situation to Inter Access, this organisation quickly came up with the right solution. IBM WebSphere Host Access Transformation Services (HATS) answered all questions. "By implementing HATS, we were able to solve the problem based on the existing business software. The data in the System i stock application was now converted automatically in real-time to html, which can be accessed wirelessly via the web browser on the hand scanner. The combination of HATS and WebSphere Application Server ensures this reliable translation process. With an eye to usability, the required screens were integrated into one well-organised screen in which the warehouse manager has at a glance a picture of the relevant information, including an intuitive user menu", states Wesselink.
The new way of working was quickly rolled out with assistance of Inter Access and the system meets expectations on stability and user-friendliness. Wesselink: "Warehouse employees can now quickly and efficiently check the stock position. All they have to do for this is scan the barcode labels of the various parts in a specific sector of the warehouse. HATS then sets up a wireless connection with the stock control application and displays the quantity recorded in a well-organised screen. Whenever the quantity is at variance, the warehouse manager enters the correct quantity on the handheld terminal which automatically transfers the data. By so doing we thus always have a very up-to-date picture of the stock." That has great advantages states Wesselink. "The continuity of our production is guaranteed. Fitters never get the wrong part should a specific item unexpectedly become defective a few times. But given the costs incurred by the stock holding, it is of prime importance that Vredestein does not carry too many parts in stock."
Following their first experience with the stock application, Vredestein has also considered implementation of HATS for the procurement system. This system is also based on IBM System i and is simple to access for various user groups. Wesselink: "They can then quickly and simply query the products they need through a user-friendly web interface. Instead of a wireless scanner, we want to use our Intranet. Authorised employees can then query products quickly and efficiently. Also in this case, we can optimally employ the power of our existing systems through a user-friendly, web-based front-end. In this way, Inter Access contributes structurally to our ongoing efforts to hone the efficiency of our organisation in order to provide our tyres at the best price-quality ratio."