Ambuja Cements : ERP Masonry

One of Indias largest cement manufacturing companies, Ambuja Cements has
taken many IT initiatives to integrate the latest technologies into its
operational systems, so as to reap business benefits at every level of the
supply chain. The IT team at Ambuja has always been forthcoming in experimenting
new technologies. For eg, in 2001 the cement company was one of the first to
deploy Red Hat Linux at remote sites for critical business applications.

Trend-setter

Last year, Ambuja Cements launched Connect India Plus, which has proved to
be one of the most significant, large scale IT deployment within the company so
far. As the companys manufacturing plants are located in remote areas where the
scope of connectivity was minimal, the resources, namely hardware, software and
people were located at plant sites. The overall integration of data was
transferred and carried out in batches. During 2006, Ambuja decided to go for
SAP as it is a standard system for all group companies.

Within two years, Ambuja rolled out Connect India Plus that was conceived as
an ERP implementation program for installing SAP with all its modules at 200
locations across India and 2,500 users with a single instance on a server in
Mumbai. The project kicked off on June 1, 2007 and went live on August 1, 2008a
period of just fourteen months.

Bihag Lalaji, CIO, Ambuja Cement

Deployed Connect India Plusan SAP ERP implementation program across 200 locations to connect 2,500 users The enterprise wide ERP went live in a period of just 14 months and helped Ambuja easily align with other group company processes

One of the prime reasons for deploying this ERP was to have a uniform,
standard, and ubiquitous system across the organization not only in India but
abroad, so that Ambuja Cement could easily align with other group company
processes, says Bihag Lalaji, CIO, Ambuja Cement. The project also promised a
reduction in cost of operations and maintenance of the IT system. It would also
enable Ambuja Cements to respond quickly to changes in the business environment.

Challenges

However, the IT team faced immense challenges while implementing this
enterprise-wide ERP. Since the company had multiple plants, each with their own
computer systems and processes, there was a need to create a single business
blueprint across the organization. On the people front, there was a need to
integrate individuals with diverse background to be able to work as a focused
team.

Besides the core team consisting of 75 members, there were 150 people
involved indirectly or directly for data migration, training, etc. All this
required enormous amount of man-management skills. Infrastructure refreshes was
another critical challenge as the IT team took on the task of setting up an
adequate and reliable WAN using MPLS and VSATS, connecting 200 locations
including factories, bulk cement terminals, grinding units, regional offices and
warehouses.

Data migration was another major challenge since data had to be imported from
eight different legacy systems. The standard master data codes had to be mapped
with the legacy codes and data had to be updated at one go. We had a dedicated
team and full support of business users from various locations, who worked
relentlessly to achieve this mammoth task, says Lalaji.

After the successful implementation of SAP, the company has been exploring
some cutting edge technologies to improve supply chain. It has implemented a
sophisticated smart-card based vehicle tracking system to improve operational
efficiency in terms of cycle-time monitoring and fleet management. This has
helped the company determine the exact cycle for a vehicle carrying cement from
the factory to a destination and carrying raw material as a return load back to
the factory. The information is dispatched to customers via SMS.

Priya Kekre

priyak@cybermedia.co.in