Case Studies - LIGHTNIN Mixer - eLogic Group, LLC

LIGHTNIN Mixer

Business Challenge

LIGHTNIN, a unit of SPX Corporation, provides industrial fluid mixers and agitators for wide range of process applications. Due to the complexity of LIGHTNIN's products, the quotation process relied heavily on in-house product experts to manually select and configure product offerings. Although some automation tools were in place, they were used exclusively by these experts due to the highly technical nature of the products. Capturing, reconciling, and posting sales orders was also an extremely time consuming, serial process involving up to a dozen steps. Orders were routed to as many as six different departments, with minimal automation, high error rates, and weeks of cycle time. LIGHTNIN desired a business solution that would simplify the quote and order processes in order to reduce costs and cycle times and improve transaction quality. In addition, the solution had to be flexible enough to handle a broad range of product/order types from simple repair parts to highly engineered industrial mixers.

eLogic Business Solution

LIGHTNIN engaged eLogic as the industry expert systems integrator to ensure that the business process, configuration design, and systems technologies were properly integrated in order to yield the expected business results. eLogic began the process by performing a thorough evaluation of LIGHTNIN's current business practices. Working closely with LIGHTNIN to determine the most effective course of action, eLogic developed a series of solution alternatives detailing expected benefits, risks, and costs.

LIGHTNIN decided to have eLogic implement a web-enabled eSales platform, that gave sales representatives and application engineers a comprehensive set of tools to streamline the quote and order process. For the new equipment business, users are now able to analyze complex application parameters and evaluate product alternatives, configure products options, price and lead-time, and generate sales proposals that included dynamically generated CAD drawings. Upon acceptance, proposals are automatically converted to orders and transferred directly to the ERP system for production. For the aftermarket parts business, users can search for part information including on-hand inventory levels and enter orders for repair parts.

Results Achieved

This project was completed in less than twelve months and under budget. Highlights of the benefits achieved were:

Quotation cycle time reduced by 50-80%
Proposal quality enhanced through generation of CAD drawings and customer-worthy proposal formats
BOM and order errors reduced by 90%
Fulfillment and warranty costs reduced
Product selection optimized through alternative comparisons
Aftermarket competitiveness improved