For over 100 years, Inco had been a North American company that brought its nickel to the rest of the world. Today however they are a truly global company, mining in both hemispheres and operating on four continents. Part of that change and diverse growth stems from a shift to a value add philosophy rather than only producing commodities. Some of their innovative solutions have helped reshape the world. When hybrid cars first into being it was because of Inco’s ground breaking technology to create foam nickel. By using foamed nickel instead of nickel plates in batteries there was a dramatic boost in battery power. Without this new material hybrid cars couldn’t hold a big enough charge and wouldn’t be nearly as efficient.

Case Study: Part IWhen the automotive industry came to Inco for their foam nickel technology, Inco responded by building a production plant in China to ensure the demands of the new world would be met. As their facilities were being constructed, Inco approached BIA for an ERP solution that would not only operate the new enterprise in China but also completely integrate with highly specialized corporate systems. Commodity management is a science in itself and Inco had invested heavily in their intelligent applications. Together Inco and BIA developed a strategy that would highly leverage their internal commodities expertise and at the same time take advantage of the latest available manufacturing technologies and best practices.

An ERP application was selected and customized using a virtual model before being implemented off-shore at the plant. It was decided that hosting would be out of the Hong Kong data center even though the plant itself was located in Dalian. One of the key requirements of the system was the ability to tie customer orders in with the origin of the raw materials. For example nickel costs are partially based on the mines they came from. The mines, their inventories and production are all managed in separate, very specific applications. In order to cost the production run of foam nickel the ERP application had to access those applications, shipping schedules, commodity prices and blend them together based on production consumptions.

After successfully implementation of the system, BIA continued to maintain and support the applications on an ongoing basis.

Case Study: Part IIShortly after the ERP implementation described in Part I a second venture was launched by Inco in Dalian. Initially a local consulting firm was engaged to manage a second ERP implementation based on the original model developed for the foam nickel company project. When this was discussed with BIA we proposed that an assessment be conducted prior to initiating the second ERP implementation. Our findings showed that the two ventures were closely enough related that they could be operated as a shared service.

By utilizing the same software instance and setting up the second venture as a separate company it was only a matter of some additional training and minor modifications to the application to meet all requirements. The existing data center and infrastructure had ample capacity for the additional work load and was already fully supported. Additionally, the global reporting (audit and tracking) was already in place along with other global shared services.

Implementing leading edge technologies are important but by themselves are not always a complete solution. By being thought leaders and considering better ways to leverage existing capabilities BIA could help Inco build on existing strengths and leveraging proven capabilities. The BIA strategy incorporated best practice, proven technology and least cost for least risk and best turnaround.

The BIA solution included the best scenario possible in every category – cost, risk, time, and capability!

BIA works hard to develop a comprehensive understanding of your business, customers, strategy and IT environment. Building on relationships and drawing on a wide range of experience and expertise, BIA is the ideal strategic partner to have at your side.

“Maximizing existing technology, rationalizing applications and deploying software as far as possible automatically drives out substantial costs – and best of

all…it costs less than not doing it!”N. Amiri, IT Director, Inco