STIEFEL prints better with SAP Business One
Innovation in Pictures
That is the STIEFEL Publishing Group’s corporate motto. To fully implement this motto, the STIEFEL Group needed flexible and future-proof business software that would comprehensively map all of its business processes. SAP Business One ensures optimized and fully integrated business and production processes for this medium-sized company. This increases transparency, shortens production times, and reduces costs.
Result: Improved Processes, Satisfied Users
The Lentingen-based publishing group was able to immediately put the benefits of the new software into practice. Faster production control, order processing, and payment processing were the immediately noticeable effects of this switch to one of the best ERP solutions.
Key Challenge:
The Stiefel Group is expanding rapidly and continuously investing in new technology. The need was for an ERP solution that effectively supports this pace of growth and maps all business processes in a transparent and end-to-end manner.
Project Goals:
- Ensure intuitive usability.
- Enable accelerated production control.
- Ensure effective functionalities for Accounts Receivable management.
Company:
As a specialist in digital printing, the STIEFEL Group produces vehicle wraps for cars, trucks, and buses on behalf of agencies and international companies. Large-format advertising posters made of PVC film or mesh vinyl cover entire building facades. In many offices, wall maps and calendars featuring STIEFEL’s logo prints help with efficient scheduling and wayfinding.
The STIEFEL Group’s success story began in 1982 in Ingolstadt, where Heinrich Stiefel founded the family business. Since then, the medium-sized company has grown into a Europe-wide group with more than 250 employees and subsidiaries in Italy, Austria, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, and the Czech Republic, among other countries.
Its customers include companies such as Audi, Allianz, Deutsche Post, Saturn, Signal-Iduna, and Thyssen-Krupp. This expansion necessitated a move from Ingolstadt to neighboring Lenting in 1999. Today, Heinrich Stiefel runs the company together with his son Bernhard.
Initial Situation:
The STIEFEL Group initially considered an industry-specific software solution for the printing industry. However, our consultants drew the company’s attention to SAP Business One, SAP’s standard business management software.
The IT manager was convinced by a presentation on SAP Business One and subsequent discussions. According to Bernhard Kress, three main reasons were decisive in this decision:
“The SAP solution makes it possible to map all business processes in an integrated manner. Furthermore, it is flexible and—as the name SAP guarantees—a sound investment. The expertise and geographical proximity of the SAP partner init consulting AG also played an important role.”
Solution:
“The fact that all company data is now consistently mapped in a single system ensures greater transparency, improves workflow, eliminates redundancies, and enhances data quality. This shortens production times and reduces costs,” says Bernhard Kress, summarizing the benefits.
Based on the improvements achieved with SAP Business One, IT Manager Kress expects that the investment in the solution will have paid for itself by 2007.
In the medium term, the STIEFEL Group plans to use the reporting capabilities integrated into SAP Business One to analyze all key business metrics from both production and administration (accounting, sales, and P&L analyses). In addition, the medium-sized company will gradually connect its foreign branches to the SAP system at its headquarters in Lenting via the Internet.
“With SAP Business One, we are excellently positioned for the future. The system supports our future growth trajectory and creates room for new innovations,” concludes IT Manager Bernhard Kress.
Highlights
- Smooth, easy migration from a DOS-based system.
- Customization of reports so they reflect company image to the client.
- Integration with Crystal Reports from Business Objects.
- Integration with The Service Manager, a service management and dispatch software solution from Shining Brow Inc.
