LEVI’S STRAUSS
Company Profile
Levi Strauss & Co. is one of the world’s largest brand-name apparel marketers, with worldwide net sales of $6.0 billion in 1998. Through a relentless focus on consumers, innovation and people, the company aims to achieve and sustain commercial success as a global marketer of branded apparel. John Serrato is Vice President of Information Systems for Europe, the Middle East Africa and is based at Brussels headquarters.
Tom Peck
Senior Vice President and Chief Information Officer
Tom Peck is the Chief Information Officer (CIO) of Levi Strauss & Co., responsible for leading the company’s global Information technology operations and services.
Peck reports to LS&Co. Chief Executive Officer John Anderson and is a member of the company’s worldwide leadership team.
Peck has a history of creating technology solutions for global consumer and entertainment brands via large-scale investments in SAP and Oracle, Vendor Managed Inventory (VMI) and Customer Relationship Management. Prior to joining Levi Strauss & Co., Peck was the CIO of MGM MIRAGE, supporting 70,000 employees across 17 global resorts such as the Bellagio and MGM Grand. As CIO, he led numerous innovations across hotel and casino operations as well as the company’s 800+ retail and restaurant venues.
Before joining MGM MIRAGE, Peck held numerous roles within the General Electric Company including CIO of NBC Universal’s global entertainment businesses which included television, motion pictures, home entertainment, consumer products and theme parks and resorts. While CIO, his team implemented a global enterprise-wide project that spanned 15 operating companies in 28 countries via SAP and other systems platforms, upgraded 25-year-old legacy systems, simplified numerous processes and expanded VMI to more than 50 retail partners around the world.
Peck began his career in the United States Marine Corps holding numerous finance and technology jobs. He is also a certified Six Sigma Master Black Belt and is proficient in process optimization strategies such as lean supply chain.
Peck earned his bachelor’s degree from the United States Naval Academy with distinction in economics, and a master’s degree in management from the Naval Postgraduate School.
INFORMATION SYSTEMS USED BY LEVI’s
Baan Enterprise Resources Planning solution
Unix hardware and an Oracle database :- An effort was also made to harmonise the software system used across the European continent.
The ERP project
Centralized support strategy
“Project 900” :- The benchmark revealed that maintenance and repairs constituted the second largest part of the global IT budget. Project 900 was launched to reduce this spending by 25%.
INFORMATION SYSTEM OF LEVI’S
The IS department had had a busy five years. Several projects had been undertaken, starting with a Business Process Review resulting in Levi’s implementing a Baan Enterprise Resources Planning solution. The implementation of packages from Manugistics and McHugh followed. As part of this overhaul, Levi’s installed new Unix hardware and an Oracle database. An effort was also made to harmonise the software system used across the European continent.
The ERP project completely changed Levi’s infrastructure, and a new, centralized support strategy changed their ways of working. As anticipated, the IS team found that these new, more complex technologies drove up compensation costs and increased headcount.
According to Serrato, the benchmark study covering Brussels HQ and 7 European affiliates was a method of taking stock following these implementations with a view to optimising operations. “Our aim is to reduce costs and to maximise value using a minimal amount of investment. Our goal is to have best of class operating environment, reducing expenditure thereby releasing funds for specific, targeted projects.”
The Benchmarking Process
The benchmarking study Levi’s engaged Gartner to carry out was an Information Technology Overview Analysis (ITOA) centred on the costs and workload of its helpdesk, distributed computing and data centre technologies. Gartner’s Measurement team was chosen to conduct the benchmark on account of Gartner’s high level of IT industry experience and expertise and Measurement’s extensive database of relevant metrics.
The benchmarking process kicked-off with a joint meeting of Gartner and Levi’s project teams. The meeting covered the processes to be undertaken and the details of the data to be collected, and set the schedule and responsibilities of each party. The Levi’s team was responsible for collecting the data, which was then reviewed by Gartner analysts, normalised into the standardised benchmarking model, and validated. Once complete, Gartner analysts conducted a detailed analysis of the data to determine the client’s performance and compare the results with that of other companies from Gartner’s database. The results were then presented to Levi’s senior management.
The results showed that Levi’s IT costs were 24% higher than the peer group benchmark average, with a more expensive helpdesk than any other organization on Gartner’s database. Analysing the helpdesk in more detail revealed that the total cost per call was over 350% more than the peer group! Levi’s disaster recovery costs were also an area of further focus, being 200% higher than the peer group average.
From Analysis to Action
The results of the ITOA benchmark provided Levi’s with a framework to focus on specific issues within the IS function. A good example of the work that has resulted is “Project 900”.
“Project 900”
The benchmark revealed that maintenance and repairs constituted the second largest part of the global IT budget. Project 900 was launched to reduce this spending by 25%.
The team assessed the need to spend on each component of the IS structure on the basis of the business or IT risk arising from choosing not to spend. Project 900 has already resulted in over $1 million in savings. Moreover, in light of these findings, Levi’s is now adopting a proactive approach to new contracts, assessing them according to new criteria.
Help Desk Redesign
As well as addressing maintenance costs, Levi’s redesigned its helpdesk function and reviewed disaster recovery contracts with vendors. Total savings in these areas so far amount to over $0.7 million.
Building in Benchmarking as ‘our way of working’
In Serrato’s view, over and above the cost savings, the overview analysis has enabled Levi’s to take a new approach to managing its IT function. “By relating service levels to cost, the benchmark helps to forge a linkage between the costs and elements of Levi’s IT. The benchmarking study was the first step in the continuing process of building a culture of accountability regarding IT costs.”
Levi’s is also much more aware of the relevant measurements, and Serrato aims to build back into the IS department procedures which can capture the applicable numbers in a coherent and consistent way. “Ultimately, we want to build in the benchmarking mentality as our way of working, so that we are aware of the impact of cost on our operations.”
“If you don’t measure IT, you can’t manage IT.”
The ITOA provides senior IT management with a comprehensive and complete overview of the relative efficiency of their IT organisation. The metrics and measurements resulting from the ITOA have enabled Levi’s to understand their current level of performance at a high level based on key efficiency indicators for each functional area.
In order to establish ‘relative performance’, the ITOA quantitatively analysed the efficiency of each major IS function and drew comparisons with database averages from peer IT organisations, taking advantage of the extensive, unparalleled database derived from Gartner’s individual measurement services. Since the ITOA, Levi’s continues to work with Gartner on a drill-down study focusing on users’ satisfaction with Levi’s IS function.
The measurements and comparisons arising from the overview analysis provided the basis for Levi’s to identify those areas of IT performance that offered the greatest opportunities for improvement.
L’OREAL
The world’s N°1 cosmetics fi rm with products distributed in 130 countries, L’Oréal has over 52,000 employees worldwide and posted consolidated revenue of €14.533 billion in 2005. At the head of an impressive portfolio of brand names covering fi ve major domains — hair care, color, skin care, makeup, and perfume — the group has long centered on innovation to establish its leadership. In addition to massive investments in R&D, refl ected in 529 new patents fi led in 2005, its innovations in management and human resources have made it one of the most desirable employers on the market for many years, particularly for young graduates.
L'Oreal Indonesia Follows L'Oreal Way of Capturing Data in Consignment Ordering Process with ABBYY FormReader™
ABBYY's Form Processing Solution Eliminates Manual Encoding of Sales and Inventories and Cuts Stock Replenishment Time by 65 Percent.
“Consignment Ordering System (COS) using ABBYY FormReader 6.5 has been successfully implemented as the front-end tool to capture data. As a result, we have a more efficient and effective way to perform better stock replenishment and the data processing time has been significantly reduced.”
Martliany Esra
MIS Department Manager
INFORMATION SYSTEMS USED BY L’OREAL
ABBYY:- ABBYY FormReader data capture product. With its use, manual encoding of sales and inventories at L’Oréal Philippines were eliminated and the processing time needed to replenish the stock was significantly reduced. L’Oréal Philippines is also able to capture sales information at the right time.
SAP connector:- its SAP connector, PowerCenter helps produce reliable data for L’Oréal’s HR function, whether for the social balance sheet in France or the multiple indicators that help the HR teams run their daily activities
PowerCenter :- PowerCenter is an integral part of a decision-making solution utilized both nationally and internationally to produce the figures appearing in the social balance sheet, the HR section of the sustainable development report, and the multiple monitoring and management indicators regarding recruiting, training, career management, etc
64-bit Technology:- For Better Performance While certain indicators are calculated on a weekly or even monthly basis, most of them are updated every day. The updating, which is done at night in batch mode, currently takes seven hours of processing, six out of seven days.
The transition to the 64-bit version will result in reduced processing times, which are essential to deliver data on time within a group that operates on the five continents.”
Background
PT L’Oréal Indonesia carries 3 brands of consumer products with 2,500 SKUs (stock keeping units) sold on a consignment basis at 48 retail counters nationwide. Distribution of products across all 48 counters is done under the supervision of PT L’Oréal Indonesia's brand manager. Timely tracking of sales and inventories at each counter is crucial for getting a better stock replenishment and proper product mix. At the end, the company's ultimate goal is to make sure that counters have the right product at the right time for the consumers. To ensure prompt and reliable document handling, resource-consuming manual data entry had to be replaced by automation. In search for the solution,
L’Oréal Indonesia learned from their counterpart, L’Oréal Philippines, of their very successful implementation of ABBYY FormReader data capture product. With its use, manual encoding of sales and inventories at L’Oréal Philippines were eliminated and the processing time needed to replenish the stock was significantly reduced. L’Oréal Philippines is also able to capture sales information at the right time. It carries 3 brands of consumer products with 775 SKUs sold on a consignment basis at 98 counters nationwide.
Because of such recommendations, L’Oréal Indonesia wished to see this superb solution and assign ASGI, a consulting company, developing COS, and ABBYY's partner based in Makati, Philippines to provide the overall solution.
Solution
ASGI had developed the special Consignment Ordering System for L’Oréal Indonesia. The use of ABBYY FormReader was proposed as part of a complete solution to the consignment sales and ordering process.
Results
With the use of ABBYY FormReader 6.5, manual encoding of sales and inventories were eliminated, and the processing time needed to replenish the stock was significantly reduced to 65%, and counters are restocked on a weekly basis. FormReader, based on ABBYY's state-of-the-art data capture technology, has been widely used in retail and many other industries. With FormReader's high effectiveness, excellent quality of data capture and user-friendly interface, L’Oréal Indonesia is able to streamline document processing and accommodate additional volumes of transactions without increasing numbers of staff.
About Asia Systems Group, Inc. (ASGI)
Founded in 1995, ASGI has committed to lead the experts in designing and developing customized systems best needed by the industries. ASGI is a Microsoft Certified Partner - ISV/Software Solutions and have been using Microsoft tools and technology together with ABBYY products to provide solutions to the industries.
“With its SAP connector, PowerCenter helps produce reliable data for L’Oréal’s HR function, whether for the social balance sheet in France or the multiple indicators that help the HR teams run their daily activities. The transition to the 64-bit version will result in reduced processing times, which are essential to deliver data on time within a group that operates on the five continents.”
PowerCenter Chosen For Access To SAP Sources
The Informatica PowerCenter data integration solution was chosen for its native connector for SAP, the primary source of HR data, allowing data from the different SAP instances of the group to be extracted, transformed, and loaded into a new SQL database.
In addition, “to the extent we sought maximum autonomy and responsiveness in meeting the users’ needs, PowerCenter’s intuitive aspect was a decisive element,” added Isabelle d’Alberto, project leader and manager of reporting within the Offi ce of Human Relations. “After four days of training and an installation phase with the help of Informatica, we were able to enter the implementation phase and begin using PowerCenter to develop the initial flows.”
More Creation Than Maintenance
Deployed since 2001, PowerCenter is an integral part of a decision-making solution utilized both nationally and internationally to produce the figures appearing in the social balance sheet, the HR section of the sustainable development report, and the multiple monitoring and management indicators regarding recruiting, training, career management, etc. For the project leaders of the HR Information Systems team, PowerCenter is a tool in their daily jobs. “The environment is not fi xed, to say the least,” noted Annelise Soyer, an HR manager. “Every day, our interlocutors request changes or the creation of indicators. The use of PowerCenter considerably simplifi es and accelerates the development of fl ows that feed into the Business Objects reports. Its fl exibility provides us with real upgradeability of our statistics and frees up our time for other tasks.” At present, the Offi ce of Human Relations manages approximately 340 reports for France and 100 for the international divisions, in addition to ad hoc reports requested by the users using Business Objects.
Transition To 64-bit Technology
For Better Performance While certain indicators are calculated on a weekly or even monthly basis, most of them are updated every day. The updating, which is done at night in batch mode, currently takes seven hours of processing, six out of seven days. “This means that the processing ends at 10 a.m. Shanghai time and we consume resources in a way that may penalize international users. To reduce processing times, we decided to switch to the 64-bit version of PowerCenter at the beginning of 2007, deployed on a Fujitsu Siemens Itanium platform. From this change, we expect a reduction of at least two hours in the nighttime processing, knowing that we will no longer be limited in terms of memory.” Other changes are planned, in particular, the deployment of version 8.1 of PowerCenter, which offers better Java support, and an upgrade to Business Objects reporting capabilities. “In the HR area, the challenge is not volumetric management but the complexity and sensitivity of data. In fi ve years of intensive use, we have never had a system freeze with PowerCenter and we know that we have a tool that provides us with timely, reliable, and auditable data. The expected benefi ts of the change in version and transition to 64-bit will consolidate the return on our investment. Despite the expanded perimeter of the solution and increased needs, the HR Corporate Information Systems staff at the end of 2006 is the same size as in 2001!”
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