| Minneapolis¡ªSeptember 30, 2004-- SoftBrands, a global leader in next-generation enterprise software for businesses in the manufacturing and hospitality sectors, today announced the successful implementation of Demand Stream at Alfmeier Corporation. Alfmeier purchased Demand Stream to reduce purchasing and planning labor, inventory and inbound freight. By implementing Demand Stream, Alfmeier has significantly reduced days of inventory while also reducing the time required to process daily releases to suppliers, by 80% (from 4 hours per day to 45 minutes per day). ¡°After the go-live of Demand Stream, we are supporting even higher production volumes with one material planner. And now with our recent implementation of the supplier portal, the hours spent every day on just communicating releases to suppliers has been replaced with a self-service environment that automates that communication,¡± said Greg Kuzmic IT manager, Alfmeier Corporation. Alfmeier develops and manufactures fluid components and systems for the automotive industry primarily for fuel management, seat comfort and convenience and engine management. ¡°Demand Stream gives us and our suppliers greater visibility of our data, enabling faster decision-making capability. We have over 80 active suppliers to our Greenville facility; all of them are using the Demand Stream supplier portal to get their releases. After less than one week, we had about 70% of our suppliers using all of the functionality of the portal that we required of them. This is largely due to the easy-to-use interface of the portal. In fact, several suppliers were so eager to start using the portal that they began using it before it officially launched so that they could see real-time inventory usage information,¡± said Kuzmic. About SoftBrands
SoftBrands is dedicated to helping maintain a balance in today¡¯s global economy, allowing customers to deliver on the benefits of real-time, demand-driven variability to their customers. SoftBrands Inc. is a global leader in providing manufacturing solutions for small to medium-sized businesses (SMBs) worldwide currently focused on the hospitality and manufacturing industries. With more than 5,000 customers in over 60 countries now actively using its manufacturing (Fourth Shift?, Fourth Shift Edition?, evolution, Demand Stream) and hospitality products, SoftBrands has established a worldwide infrastructure for distribution, development and support of enterprise software. The company, headquartered in Minneapolis, Minnesota, has over 500 employees with branch offices in Europe, Asia, Australia, the Middle East and Africa. (Additional information at www.softbrands.com) |
