“We have gone from multiple material shortages to zero. It’s easy to see when stock is running out, and we have ample time to react. Previously, we often had to do last-minute changeovers, whereas now we have clear visibility into which raw materials are
running low.”
– Michael Casella, General Manager, C-A-T® Resources.
Customer Profile
C-A-T® Resources manufactures tourniquets for use in combat and crises. The Combat Application Tourniquet (C-A-T®) completely stops blood flow in traumatic injuries with severe bleeding. C-A-T® tourniquets are used by soldiers and paramedics as well as first aid for climbers and extreme sportsmen.
The Business Challenge
C-A-T® Resources has grown significantly over the past 15 years, and its existing ERP system could no longer meet its needs. The company experienced challenges in areas of its operation such as inventory tracking, accessing accurate, up-to-date information, and a lack of agility to meet evolving market demands.
The Solution
From an initial longlist of eight ERP solutions, C-A-T® Resources ultimately selected SYSPRO for its flexibility, powerful inventory management capability, and ability to provide a comprehensive end-to-end view of the business.
The Outcome
The implementation of SYSPRO has enabled C-A-T® Resources to run its manufacturing operations at optimal levels. High-level benefits include the ability to quickly accommodate different types of work in line with changing market requirements, enhanced inventory and accounting visibility, and a more detailed understanding of operator efficiencies and performance
Flexing for growth
C-A-T® Resources is a vertically integrated manufacturing business that makes the Combat Application Tourniquet. However, the company also needs a system that isn’t tailored to one type of manufacturing, so that it has the ability to flex its operation to accommodate different types of work as market requirements change.
Michael Casella, General Manager of C-A-T® Resources, says: “Generally, there is a steady demand for our product. However, when we have spare capacity, we need to be able to turn that into an opportunity by taking on other manufacturing jobs. Conversely, the unfortunate advent of the Russia-Ukraine conflict pushed our sales exponentially which has meant increasing resources, working longer hours, and overtime. With SYSPRO, we have the agility we need to scale either way.”
Using SYSPRO, C-A-T® Resources has been able to meet production demand spikes of up to 300% in one month, with few to no incidents.
Greater visibility, tighter controls
One of the criteria in C-A-T® Resources’ search for a new ERP solution was the ability to control its inventory and accounting management with improved access to real-time, accurate and relevant data.
“SYSPRO enabled us to have excellent control of our inventory and accounting. It’s easy to see and understand exactly what inventory we have, what we need to order, and whether we have enough raw material while simultaneously keeping track of Work in Progress (WIP) and finished goods. We simply didn’t have that before we implemented SYSPRO because our previous system was unable to accommodate the company’s growth,” Casella says.
With improved visibility into inventory and finished goods, C-A-T® Resources now has exact, up-to-date information on the number of finished goods and the location of each stock code. It is also able to perform transaction-level tracking of items using SYSPRO’s Lot Traceability module.
A clear benefit of this increased visibility is more accurate costing.
“Previously, we didn’t know the cost per tourniquet,” Casella says. “We have that now and it’s easy to track and identify trends.” This has become increasingly relevant with the recent spike in demand, which leads to increased overtime for labor, as well as the rising cost of raw materials.
In order to access relevant information, Casella has created numerous reports using SYSPRO’s built-in reporting capabilities. This includes reports on everything the company wants to monitor daily for inventory control, production, purchasing and sales. Visibility into the company’s critical metrics is key to staying agile and making informed decisions and adjustments immediately, rather than weeks or months later.
“It is very easy for me to create any view I need with just a bit of knowledge about the tables,” he says. The automated reporting in SYSPRO is excellent, all I need to do is open the system and all the information I need is instantly accessible.”
Optimizing the power of ERP for improved accounting and inventory management
After a smooth implementation of SYSPRO, the C-A-T® Resources management team recognized a need to upskill staff in terms of best-practice manufacturing and automated accounting. To achieve this goal, the company teamed up with Edgeware, a SYSPRO partner. As a result, the company is able to optimize SYSPRO’s capabilities while still supporting its unique processes, where necessary.
One of the benefits has been enhancing the way sales orders are organized. “This improved with the implementation,” Casella says. “We were making a sales order for every line on a customer’s purchase order instead of having a sales order with multiple lines tied to one customer purchase order.
“This meant that our sales orders and customer purchase orders were always out of alignment. With SYSPRO, this has been rectified, and our sales orders are now in sync with our purchase orders.” C-A-T® Resources has also established a clear safety stock plan while reducing stockholding, using SYSPRO’s Forecasting and Material Requirements Planning modules.
“We have gone from multiple material shortages to zero. It’s easy to see when stock is running out, and we have ample time to react. Previously, we often had to do last-minute changeovers, whereas now we have clear visibility into which raw materials are running low,” Casella says.
Understanding operator performance with SYSPRO MOM
SYSPRO’s Manufacturing Operations Management (MOM) module has enabled C-A-T® Resources to track operator efficiency and performance. With its previous system, all labor was posted to a single ‘job’ and it was difficult to track operator efficiency and calculate the labor cost per job. With SYSPRO’s job-based capabilities, this process is now seamless, providing visibility into operator efficiency and greatly improving cost accuracy. Additionally, to boost productivity, C-A-T® Resources deployed a customization where the operator clocked in for their shift and job simultaneously at the workstation.
“The interface with MOM is seamless. We can run reports and show staff their performance. We pay a quarterly operator efficiency bonus, so our people are keen to track their performance in realtime, and it facilitates better job costing as well,” Casella says. A future goal for C-A-T® Resources is to gain visibility into operator performance per workstation.
“Looking ahead, we will be exploring ways to enhance our processes even further. For now, our operation is running as efficiently as it can.”
