Herndon, VA June 5, 2002 e-Business software provider Baan beefed up its auto industry solution this week, adding new customer and supplier relationship management functionality to iBaan for Automotive.
Baan's new "Service Pack" for automotive adds to the existing sales, sales finance, planning, purchase and electronic data interchange (EDI) functions in the solution. The solution provider said the upgrades came as a result of feedback from such iBaan customers as Dana, Donnelly, Fiat, and International Truck and Engine.
The new offering focuses on demand management to help optimize supply chain effectiveness in the automotive industry, giving suppliers visibility of short-term changes in customer schedules, as well as material requirements for long-term planning, according to Baan. It is intended to increase the flexibility of the current solution, giving users better visibility and control of inbound requirements for planning, shipping, KANBAN and sales orders.
Baan said the Service Pack offers iBaan for Automotive users better access to historical data and provides analysis tools for monitoring shipments to customers and evaluating vendor and supplier performance. The solution is supposed to make management of the supplier base easier via approved supplier coding and improved visibility, and it specifically addresses minority supplier tracking for North American customers. Supplier delivery status can be monitored with "at-a-glance" displays of schedule data as of the issue date or current date and ahead/behind status.
Fred Thomas, industry director for automotive at Baan, suggested that the new upgrades would help companies using the iBaan suite achieve faster return on investment in the solution.
