Häfele

Häfele is a leading international supplier of furniture fittings, architectural hardware, electronic locking systems and technical hardware advice. Häfele UK’s award winning national distribution centre is based at its head office in Rugby, Warwickshire, from where it can distribute any product in its immense range to almost any location within 48 hours. Häfele UK has a turnover of approximately £80 million and has around 350 employees.

About the Project

In 2007, with its existing system coming to the end of its support life and no development planned, Häfele decided it was time to look for a new one. The key process owners worked with NTT DATA Business Solutions’ experts to blueprint the system. They went through every process that Häfele used and looked at how it could be done in SAP. “We made a conscious decision that the migration to an SAP solution would be evolution not revolution,” says Russell Morris, Financial Director of Häfele. “So we didn’t look at re-engineering our processes. However, if there were easy gains to be made, we took them.” As processes were blueprinted NTT DATA Business Solutions’ specialists configured them in the system and then gave the key process owners access so that they could test them.

Ireland went live on 1st August 2009, while the UK went live over the 2009 Christmas period. Both went very smoothly indeed. “Throughout the implementation we kept our staff fully informed,” says Garry Marlow, Managing Director of Häfele. “In reality, there wasn’t a single area of the business that wasn’t involved or didn’t contribute in some way. I think that commitment, from the board down, is one of the reasons the project was so successful.”

The biggest benefit Häfele has gained is that it now has a solid starting point that it can build on to deliver greater efficiency and growth. “Thanks to the dedication of our own people and NTT DATA Business Solutions our SAP system has been successfully implemented,” says Russell.