The Customer Magazine 1|2010
Need to Get Users Excited About Software
Following its new mantra of solutions with instant value, SAP is transforming itself to be faster and more customer-oriented. SAP Spectrum talks with Jim Hagemann Snabe to find out how the company aims to achieve this.
Touching Lives With Technology
Some of the people who work the phones for Deutsche Post DHL’s human resources hotline are blind. Along with special resources for the visually impaired, they use the SAP ERP Human Capital Management solution to carry out their daily tasks.
Grabbing the Tiger by the Tail
The financial crisis, the drive toward internationalization, and SAP Enterprise Support services were three topics weighing heavily on the minds of SAP user companies in Japan last year.
23.09.2009
Bathtubs on Demand
At Cosentino you can see the networked factory in action. SAP software integrates all of the Spanish company’s processes, giving it the agility to develop new products faster and address customer needs more effectively.
Bath furniture by Cosentino from Spain (photo: Duravit)
Alberto Quevedo needs no convincing of the benefits of an integrated system landscape – Cosentino’s young CIO is fully immersed in one every day: “We swear by networking, and we’ve automated all of our processes,” he says enthusiastically. From planning and production through to sales and distribution, all the company’s business processes are linked together via SAP solutions.
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Cosentino processes natural stones, such as quartz and granite, and manufactures its own patented product, Silestone, a nonporous, antibacterial quartz composite. In the decade before the current economic slump, the company returned two-digit growth figures year for year and expanded across the world, establishing factories, warehouses, distribution centers, and retail outlets on four continents. Its main markets are Europe and the United States, but its products are also popular in countries such as Dubai and Australia.
Worldwide logistics network under control
Cosentino’s production facilities are located in the Andalusian province of Almeria. Three lines manufacture Silestone, one processes marble, and a fifth develops special products. From Almeria, Cosentino products are transported to its European distribution centers. The company also operates processing plants in the United States, Mexico, Brazil, the U.K., and Sweden. It draws its supplies of natural stone from fourteen mines in southern Spain, and also mines for granite in Brazil. In its most recent business move, Cosentino extended its warehouse network in China to better serve the emerging market there.
At its European locations, Cosentino already works with SAP NetWeaver Business Warehouse, SAP Customer Relationship Management, and SAP ERP Human Capital Management. The other countries with sales operations are due to follow suit in the near future.
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