Short-Run Manufacturer Builds Long-term Success with EnterpriseIQ

Manufacturing Complexity Simplified
With EnterpriseIQ in place, Donnelly has seen improvements in every aspect of its business. RealTime™ Production Monitoring allows shop floor supervisors to access production data as it occurs from any computer in the plant, instead of having to spend time walking the shop floor to check presses. Donnelly has also eliminated excess data entry and saved numerous hours of overtime because team leaders and supervisors no longer have to work long beyond their shifts to input data, something that consumed many hours of overtime each day.

Internal, supplier and customer communications have improved, too. Invoicing, which took four hours a day, is now complete by 9:00 each morning. But perhaps the biggest factor of success is the level of complexity or growth Donnelly has been able to manage.

For the plastics industry, Plante & Moran, the nation's 11th largest certified public accounting and business advisory firm, has defined manufacturing complexity as the number of active resins multiplied by the number of active presses multiplied again by the number of active molds a company has in process. According to Jerry Bienias, Donnelly's vice president of finance and technical operations, the upper quartile of this index is 1.2 million, but Donnelly's complexity index as measured by Plante & Moran tops 42 million.

"Plante & Moran was completely surprised by the level of complexity we manage," said Bienias. "With EnterpriseIQ we have doubled our complexity and grown our business by 60 percent, all with a smaller office staff than we had before we installed IQMS. EnterpriseIQ simplifies processes so we can embrace a greater level of complexity and manage it well."

Donnelly was also able to move its scheduling system into EnterpriseIQ with very little effort. This made the switch to a new system less painful in that the company did not have to change an established system that already worked well. 

"At Donnelly, we believe knowing our customers and their business intimately is critical to our success," said Bienias. "We appreciate that IQMS operates under that same premise and is able to adapt their product to meet specific customer requirements with very little effort or added cost."

Optimized for Long-term Success
Donnelly was up and running with EnterpriseIQ within six months, and now uses almost all modules including RealTme™  Production Monitoring, Quality Management and EDI/XML. The ease with which Donnelly's employees can now maneuver through every level of business data has saved Donnelly countless hours and eliminated the mistakes that were inherent with a manual-based system. In fact, the benefits of having EnterpriseIQ are so far reaching that Kirscht believes Donnelly made the best choice in selecting IQMS as a long-term business partner.

"Our customers tend to be large and leading public companies that have varied and exacting demands, but we're a small private company with finite resources," explained Kirscht. "Having an ERP system that supports and confirms our business strategy allows us to focus on our core competencies and excel where others might fail. Had we not migrated to EnterpriseIQ, we could not have grown as we have, and we would be struggling to fulfill our promise to the marketplace. The fact that we are not struggling, that we are on a pathway of optimization for the long-term, tells me we made a good choice. And that's very gratifying." 

Beyond the operating system, Donnelly wanted an ERP solution that could handle the unique requirements of injection molders, such as add back of regrind, family molds and multi-cavity molds. The company also wanted a system that had a large enough install base to ensure committed long-term development and continual improvement. 

"We were looking for fit, function and future," said Kirscht. "Going into our search we thought that might be a tough combination to find, but early on we found exactly that in EnterpriseIQ from IQMS."

As Kirscht explained, historically the plastics industry has been under served from an information technology standpoint. Off-the-shelf ERP solutions typically are not a good fit, and larger systems often require bolt-on, third party software for customization. 

"EnterpriseIQ was different," said Kirscht. "Right off the curb it looked like an incredible fit, and the more we looked, the more apparent the value."

Donnelly selected EnterpriseIQ for its comprehensive functionality, and the fact that— though EnterpriseIQ is designed for all manufacturing types — it can specifically handle the distinctive issues related to injection molding. 

"There are a lot of hard truths in our industry that we need software to manage," said Kirscht. "For example, you might have one tool that makes 64 parts every cycle. Most ERP systems can't handle these truths. You have to lie to the system to trick it into doing what you need it to do. We selected EnterpriseIQ because it easily manages many key aspects of our business. EnterpriseIQ can handle the truth."

Many other factors also contributed to Donnelly's selecting EnterpriseIQ. Donnelly liked that EnterpriseIQ is easy to use, intuitive and required a modest level of training. The company also liked that EnterpriseIQ is contained and extendable within a single database, no third-party add-ons needed...ever.

"IQMS' commitment to enhance and improve its single-source software for the future success of its customers was critical to us," explained Kirscht. "We did not want to make a significant investment only to be left behind in a few years or be required to purchase a third-party solution just to add functionality. IQMS offered the best fit and functionality at an attractive price, on a platform that should be around and vibrant for a long time to come."

IQMS was acquired by Dassault Systèmes® and has been rebranded as DELMIAWorks, part of the 3DEXPERIENCE® Works design to manufacturing software portfolio for mid-market manufacturers.