Seco needed to safeguard its global delivery promise

Seco delivers tools worldwide. Because they promise delivery within 24 hours. Their systems simply cannot go down.  We helped them both safeguard supplies and get a monitoring solution that responds quickly to critical events – around the clock.

Seco’s promise to deliver in 24 hours to the whole world means that monitoring the company’s global network is crucial to its business. Unforeseen incidents that go unnoticed and unresolved put their customer deliveries at risk, along with the profitability and credibility of the company.

A change was needed – quickly

By Easter 2016, it was clear to Seco that they needed to make an important change, fast. Their supplier of monitoring at the time was not meeting the requirements and Seco were looking for a partner who could ensure that the systems would never stop.

“If a machine breaks down, our supplier must be able to help us get a spare machine in operation within an hour of the decision being made,” says Jan Danielsson, Senior Systems Engineer and Solution Architect at Seco.

Once a new agreement was signed with Qlosr, complete monitoring and operation would be in place within just 21 working days, which also ran over the Easter weekend.

Monitoring of 16 systems was required

Success depended entirely on Qlosr’s ability to get everything in place quickly without affecting Seco’s deliveries and business-critical processes. The new software would be installed to monitor the M3 business system and an entire multi-platform environment with 16 different systems.

Change of business system

At the same time, all of Seco, with 50 subsidiaries around the world, would move to a single business system.

Jan Danielsson explains:

“When everyone works in the same system, using the same database, we can get higher-quality information and increased stability. We also avoid integration problems and minimise the amount of manual work. We had high expectations for this change.  At the same time, it was important that the installation would not disrupt operations.”

The whole network in one view

Despite the time constraints and high demands, everything went well. A tool for advanced visualisation of the status of the entire network in a shared view (“single pane of glass”) was installed, and more tasks were automated to minimise the need for manual work. Productivity and profitability could be ensured throughout the process.

Jan Danielsson is delighted with the new partnership.

“Firstly, Qlosr is structured and documents everything extremely well. We feel safe, even in person-to-person relationships. We have a designated technical helpdesk that we can call at any time, monthly operating meetings, and seven technicians on call around-the-clock in case something happens.”

More than just a customer in the crowd

For Seco, it is vital not to be just another customer in the crowd.

“Our experience working with the most prominent organisations is that it is easy to drown as a customer and not be given much importance. Quick help is simply not available, but now it is. At the same time, our new solution minimises the amount of manual work with the automated functions. Working with Qlosr was definitely the right choice for us,” concludes Jan Danielsson.

SECO FACTS

Seco, based in Fagersta, Sweden, is part of the Sandvik Group and is one of the world’s largest suppliers of tools for milling, turning, holemaking, and holding equipment. The company has wholly owned subsidiaries in 50 countries and representatives in over 70 countries. They provide customers with tools and processes crucial to their productivity and profitability.