Cimage solution helps drive Turkish car manufacturers workflow

Turkish car manufacturer Turk Otomobil Fabrikasi AS (Tofas) is jointly controlled by Italy's Fiat and Turkish conglomerate Koc Holding. It produces around 40 percent of all automobiles made in Turkey and has also begun producing new models earmarked specifically for export, including the Doblo, the new Fiat multi space, multi purpose car, manufactured exclusively in Turkey. Tofas expects exports in 2001 to reach around $800 million, and $1 billion in the following year.

In 1998 Tofas identified some key business processes in their purchasing and logisitcs operations that would benefit from a new computer solution for document management and workflow. Tofas reviewed the market and found many systems that met their basic criteria: working on databases, offering connections to the web, collaborative working and groupware. 

They had some specific technical requirements that quickly led them to choose Cimage. They liked the use of the full capabilities of the Oracle relational database, the fully integrated workflow, quick e-form development and the simplicity of publishing on the web, and high security standards. They had additional requirements for easy integration with clients, agents and suppliers and connection to business systems such as Baan and Oracle Applications. 

The most important factors in their decision to choose Cimage were the skills and experience of Cadet, the accredited Cimage Business Partner in Turkey. In their role as systems integrator Cadet were able to analyse the needs of Tofas and offer advice on the startup model based on their knowledge base of the software.

After installation on a Sun Starfire server and basic training, the first project was for a purchase order management solution to control the incoming requests for proposal (RFP) for the Tofas products.

This solution enables RFPs to be entered on the customised e-forms of Cimage, starting an approval procedure across all the departments involved in producing a final price for the request, located in both the Istanbul and the Bursa offices. All the necessary documentation is available with the e-forms as part of the workflow. If the request turns into an order, similar processes use the workflow to decrease the time from order to shipment, manage the time spent in departments on the processes and find the bottlenecks in the order-to-shipment steps.

In an increasingly competitive market the system has reduced response times and improved customer service, as well as providing data for planning future production. Tofas are also now able to analyse sales patterns, shipment times and profitability.

After the experience of the first project Tofas decided that Cadet's rapid application development methodology, combined with the easy customization and implementation of Cimage, could be applied to their other business process management needs.

Tofas wanted to control the trucks entering/leaving the factory in Bursa by recording the time of the movement, the weight, the container type and the licence plate number of the truck. This would also give them a list of all the trucks in the factory at any time. With this information, Tofas can improve shipment planning on a country basis.

A workflow system was used to define who needs to enter the required information into the e-forms and who has query only access, enabling them to reach the right information at the right time. The documentation is included with the forms in the workflow and the document meta-data also passes from the Cimage system to the ERP system and vice versa. This includes details such as the order number, record date, the wait in the customs area, invoice number, etc.

This system has resulted in decreased response times to clients and provides data which is used for future production plans.

Tofas are also now using Cimage to manage the contract documents for the DOBLO project, FIAT's new multispace, multipurpose car which is being manufactured exclusively in Turkey. 

Tofas is also planning projects to register all their critical documents in Cimage, including their other existing forms, all related technical drawings and reports. Using web clients, everyone in Tofas, as well as all of their clients and suppliers, has access to the right information at the right time with a very high security and access rights control.

Document Management - The traditional approach