GODIVA is a premium chocolate company, dedicated to opening people’s eyes to a more wonderful world. What started in a humble home workshop in Brussels over 95 years ago, is now available and beloved in more than 100 countries around the world.
The Challenge
- Manual Excel-based processes with current ERP, leading to data integrity and security issues, version control problems, and email delays.
- Long timeline of workflows and decision-making.
- 2,500+ hours of manual ERP data entry annually, with large risk of human error.
- No ability for early-stage costing and capacity planning, causing costly air freight and delayed demand forecasting.
- Lack of measurable visibility into innovation strategy and margin targets.
Our solution to these issues was PAT
Our solution to these issue was PAT. PAT is a web-based portal integrated with ERP that covers end-to-end new product costing with robust field level security and collection, with product stages (draft, published, closed). The process started with Cost Accounting setting up templates, Marketing completing new product request page, other functional groups completing BOM entry, packaging pricing, labor pricing (or purchased goods pricing), product net weight, and overhead — all guided by robust error messaging. The built in reporting provides insight on missing information and financial analysis. Upon acceptance, the upload of information from PAT into ERP eliminated hours of data entry and keying errors. During the entire process, all key functions involved with products had visibility to what was in the pipeline, what stage it was at and estimated volumes.
What PAT Does:
- Web-based portal for managing new product cost modeling, with real-time analysis and intelligent dashboards.
- Fully integrated with PLM (Interspec) and ERP systems for seamless data exchange.
- Centralized repository for all product costings since 2007, enabling research, trending, and data mining.
- Supports innovation pipeline visibility 18–24 months forward, with tools for scenario planning and sensitivity analysis.
- Robust security based on security groups, fields, and status of costing item.
- +12 Security Groups (i.e., Marketing, Cost Accounting, BOM, Inside Labor, Outside Labor, Co-manufacturer, Regulatory, and Purchasing).
- Owned and administered by Supply Chain, with no external licensing or hosting costs.
The Results
- Replaced manual Excel-based processes, eliminating data integrity and security issues, version control problems, and email delays.
- Reduced time to market by 45 days on average by streamlining workflows and decision-making.
- Eliminated 2,500+ hours annually of manual ERP data entry, reducing human error.
- Enabled early-stage costing and capacity planning, avoiding costly air freight and improving demand forecasting.
- Provided measurable visibility into innovation strategy and margin targets, supporting AOP and S&OP processes.