Established in 1972, Denroy Plastics Ltd is a leading provider of precision plastics injection mouldings. A subsidiary of Denroy Group Ltd, the company offers an integrated design, tooling and manufacturing operation, providing customers in the aerospace and defence, medical, materials handling and construction industries with a single source solution, from concept to full volume production.
With a turnover of £20 million, the Denroy Group has extensive knowledge and expertise in processing a diverse range of polymers from the most common polypropylene grades to the high engineering grades of PEEK and PPS used in the aerospace industry. The company also manufactures the DENMAN range of hairbrushes and combs.
All change
Against a backdrop of increased demand in the aerospace market in particular, growing levels of complexity within its operating environment, and a need for higher quality management information, Denroy undertook a review of its existing ERP systems. Following a tender process, the plastics company selected Infor CloudSuite Industrial (SyteLine) through Infor partner and business software consultancy Inforlogic.
“Our chosen system had to support a number of objectives,” Kevin McNamee, Group CEO, Denroy Group explains. “Increased demand for full project management from some of our aerospace customers required new capabilities as this process is multi-faceted, spanning component design, tool manufacture, component manufacture through to quality control and traceability. We needed a solution which could handle the complexity involved to deliver a seamless, superior customer experience.”
As part of its focus on the customer experience, Denroy also set out a need for enhanced management information in order that its sales team could perform greater analysis and create timely estimates in response to enquiries.
Partnership approach
“Inforlogic’s in-depth knowledge, diligence and expertise greatly assisted in delivering our implementation on time and to budget – which is no mean feat in this industry,” he continues. “They asked so many questions to truly get the crux of what we needed from the software. This confidence, combined with a great synergy with Inforlogic’s consultants made for a smooth project, testament to which is that our first phase went live on schedule and within budget.”
Quality planning
Infor CloudSuite Industrial is now delivering benefits across four core areas within Denroy, sales; capacity planning; quality management and managing complexity.
Responding to enquiries and providing estimates is hugely time consuming for Denroy, but using the software, the sales team can source the latest prices and availability to create quotes quickly and accurately. As well as promoting a better service, this also provides an opportunity to capitalise on growth potential across the business.
“Better visibility and management information has in turn, allowed us to make better decisions on numerous aspects of the business,” Kevin points out. “We’ve been able to reduce our inventory by 20%, but of even greater value is the improvement in our capability to promise which we use continuously. Because we have visibility of demand, scheduling and capacity, we can provide customers with the most accurate updates and projections on orders, based on Bills of Materials and lead time schedules, easily and confidently. This in turn has enabled us to uphold our SC21 Gold Standard which requires quality and delivery rates of 99-100% at all times.”
Quality management is crucial for Denroy, and Infor CloudSuite Industrial has delivered enhanced recording and retrievability of all aspects of production, improving traceability and supporting compliance.
“We are now able to trace any aspect of an order across the entire system at the click of a button, which means that when we are audited, we know that we can access documentation on transactions, materials or schedules quickly and easily. Not only does this reduce a potential headache for us, but allows us to provide a better experience for customers,” he adds.
Finally, complexity is rife within a business such as Denroy’s. With 3500 live components, and multiple combinations of components and materials to inject and mould, as well as a producing over three million hair products each year, harnessing this to ensure production is tightly controlled and efficient, is imperative. Using Infor CloudSuite Industrial, Denroy has a live picture of production and can exercise greater control over scrap and labour efficiency.
The Future
“We are very pleased to have achieved so much relatively quickly, and are looking forward to expanding the solution to encompass enhanced Business Intelligence and user experience,” Kevin concludes.
“The team at Inforlogic is great to work with, responsive and professional, and whenever we have a query, we have confidence that Inforlogic’s consultants will be on hand to help. In partnership with the team, and with a best in class ERP system embedded in our business, we look forward to embracing whatever challenges the coming years bring.”
