C R Narayanan says implementation of ERP has helped the company in improving operational processes

Once it had a sound and efficient networking infrastructure in place, and a reliable communications setup, Alstom Power India was ready to implement an Enterprise Resource Planning solution. Gaurav Patra explains how the company went about the process and what benefits it now enjoys

Alstom Power India is a heavyweight in the areas of power generation, power transmission and distribution. The company undertakes fast track power projects and has offices across 14 locations in India. Given the line of business that Alstom is into and the degree of operations it has in the country, a sound and efficient networking infrastructure is an essential requirement.

Sustainable online communication is one of the most important factors that ensures business efficiency. A mutual exchange of information—among different users, across various locations—facilitates the sharing of a common knowledge pool regardless of geographical limitations. “Without an efficient network this is not possible and for that the backbone infrastructure has to be very strong,” says C R Narayanan, company IT manager, Alstom Power India. For its 750-odd workforce, the company has around 900 PCs. The company also has around 80 hubs from different vendors.

Solid network infrastructure
“If you want to have a competitive advantage, you should know how to make use of the various IT tools that are available,” says Narayanan. The company’s IT infrastructure speaks volumes about the IT usage within the company. “Without a good and reliable set-up, nobody will be able to compete with its rivals. In a competitive environment, if we have to get some business, we have to be better than others,” he adds. Today, the company has all possible IT tools; it has 14 locations across the country, including the project sites; and all 14 locations have Local Area Networks.

Alstom has a huge engineering department where different functions are carried out. All these functions have been automated using a workflow application based on Oracle, and document control and management system based on Lotus Notes.

Considered to be one of the major users of Lotus Notes in India, Alstom uses this software for all its messaging activities as well. Also, for the engineering department, the company uses PDS and PDMS for layout and monitoring. The IT set-up of the company utilises Groupware applications that run on Lotus Notes. “The presence of a sound networking infrastructure is definitely making a difference as far as functioning of Notes is concerned,” says Narayanan. Even at the project sites they usually create engineering offices. All the data available at the main engineering office is extended to the project engineering offices. Any drawing that needs to be made available is approved or modified at the site office at the earliest. This helps the people to work on a fresh plan. And this helps in reducing the cycle time as well as save a lot of money on rework.Before the deployment of an enterprise resource Planning (ERP) package, the power major wanted to have a good and reliable communications network. For this, it opted for VSAT network from Hughes Escorts Communications. Today, all the branches and site offices of the company are connected through VSATs. “We do not have a mix of leased lines and VSATs, it’s only VSATs. VSATs are more reliable than other options and we can also run bandwidth-hungry applications on the same,” says Narayanan.

ERP selection
The next logical step at Alstom was to implement ERP in order to integrate various functions and also to control its operations. Today, the company uses almost all the modules of SAP. The ERP implementation presented a high level of data integration.

The implementation of ERP at Alstom was not an overnight decision. Before the ERP implementation, the company had different systems for different activities. Key applications such as payroll and financial accounting were within the network. And, these applications were running within the different local area networks as well. In effect, the same report coming from different people at different locations had different figures. Also, the company had some homegrown applications that were abandoned when people quit. “Like any other corporate, we were very poor as far as documentation was concerned,” says Narayanan. So, integration was the need of the time. This actually forced the management to think of an integrated system and that’s why we decided to go in for an ERP solution,” he informs. “ERP has helped the company immensely. Today nobody asks any other department for information. One can log in and see the reports online,” he further adds.

As far as the selection of the ERP vendor is concerned, they evaluated four vendors—SAP, Baan, JD Edwards and Oracle Apps. And as per the working environment of the company and their needs, they decided to go in for SAP. “Another factor, that went in favour of SAP, was that worldwide all our new ERP implementations were on SAP. That made my decision much easier,” notes Narayanan. The power major did not go in for a big bang approach. Initially, they ran a pilot project and went live one by one at each location. Today, all its nine locations (apart from the project locations) are connected to the SAP tool.

“One of the main reasons for the success of our ERP project was that the project was considered as an investment. Also, key people from different departments were involved in the project,” remarks Narayanan. Migration from a legacy system to ERP is not that easy a task. The staff at Alstom was used to working in a particular environment, and did not take to the changes very easily. Moreover, for an ERP implementation you also have to have the local people involved. Convincing the management to spare the best personnel was quite a daunting task for Narayanan, but he eventually managed to form a good team and also had a steering committee, which was keeping a track of the implementation on a regular basis.

Benefits
With the implementation of ERP the company was able to implement better cost-control measures and this improved operational processes. It also reduced the cycle time of order processing, reduced expenditure and helped in keeping a better track of different processes internally. The company is using the ERP system for multiple activities like sale order system and manufacturing system, and all these systems are integrated. This helps the product manager to get the required information at any point of time. Also, with the help of this system, they do a result analysis of different projects, which gives them a clear picture about the status of the project. “Benefits of ERP are innumerable. You can take steps to execute the project in the right way, rather than doing a post mortem after the failure of a particular project,” says Narayanan. “With the help of ERP, at any point of time you are in absolute control of the project,” he adds. The company has implemented almost all the available modules of ERP.

Training is always considered to be an integral part of an ERP implementation. “Training is a continuous process. We have user documentation. Training is part and parcel of an ERP implementation,” says Narayanan. “And, in case of SAP ERP, it is not that user friendly. So, people need to be continuously trained,” he further added. The power major has spent around Rs 8 crore for the ERP implementation.

The ERP implementation at Alstom works in a Windows NT environment. “This is a very conscious decision taken right from the beginning,” he says. Narayanan feels that the awareness about the NT platform is high, and of late, it has become quite a stable platform too. That’s why the company chose NT, and the fact that the cost works out much less than other options clinched the deal for Microsoft. Soon, Narayanan is planning to go in for a version upgrade of the existing SAP system and with that they will also be going in for archiving.