Central Supplier Management system at the Star Cooperation Group

Since its founding in 1997, the Star Cooperation group of companies has been accompanying its customers in numerous projects in After Sales, Vehicle Electronics and Sales and offers consulting and implementation solutions in the fields of technology, logistics, printing and media as well as digital business. Their know-how is bundled in such a way that the customers of the Star Cooperation group benefit from their interdisciplinary teams and cross-group synergies.

This versatility of the solution portfolio also presents the purchasing of the Star Cooperation group with very special challenges. The heterogeneity of the various product groups ranging from technology, media and IT to building and vehicle management, personnel, logistics and finance must be taken into account individually in their assessment, while at the same time preserving a central overall view.

In order to fulfill this task, the Star Cooperation group introduced a central supplier management and evaluation system last year with the solution provider Simmeth System.

"The goal of the project was an improved bundling of suppliers and support for making the right choice of suppliers," explains Maja Müller, Head of Purchasing at the Star Cooperation Group. "The transparency of the supplier management system sensitises those involved in the ordering process regarding the correct ordering behavior and thus leads to sustainable process improvements."

And last but not least, a whole series of simplifications in daily business were aimed for. For example, the recording of complaints and the automatic calculation of quality indicators. Or the central filing of contracts and certificates and the linking of their key data such as the expiration date with warning signals.

The project was implemented with the Supply-Chain Management software solution SC-Manager from Simmeth System with the use of the modules Supply-Monitor Supplier Manager and SC-Evaluator Supplier Evaluation. In the first step, together with the consultants from Simmeth System, a specification sheet was created detailing booking processes, workflows, algorithms, data structures and interfaces. Subsequently, the central database of the SC manager based on a SQL Server was docked to the data-carrying SAP system. The database is automatically supplied daily with the defined data. "The advantage for our customers is that not only our consultants have many years of experience, but also the software is equipped and preconfigured with templates based on this wealth of experience. Therefore, you never start "from scratch", but only adapt booking logic and workflows to local conditions, "explains Markus Simmeth, Managing Director of Simmeth System. Thus, the software was implemented and ready for use within a few weeks in the Star Cooperation IT landscape.

After an intensive, several-week trial with test users from the various sectors, the roll-out for the entire company took place at the end of February. Gradually, the suppliers are evaluated and built up a corresponding information base. The goal is to rate each supplier at least twice a year by questionnaire. Complaints are recorded in Excel instead of using web-based questionnaires. The complaint rate is thus automatically continuously available. It is summarized with the ratings from questionnaires to clear scorecards like the key figures delivery reliability and quantity loyalty, which are calculated daily from Going Live the document data. Due to the central filing of certificates and contracts of the suppliers, which now takes place gradually, together with the master data, key figures and complaints a complete, clear and central supplier file is created.

Step by step, a methodical supplier management system is integrated and consolidated into the daily processes of all parties involved in purchasing and technology. From 9 product groups, up to 100 users now use the Supply Monitor Supplier Manager module for supplier selection. "In only a few months, we were able to significantly improve the processes in supplier management, in order to achieve the set goals, we will still need some time. However, the project certainly counted on this date ", states Silke Bauer, project manager of the purchasing department of the Star Cooperation group of companies.