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From the ingredients to the finished products. Process control using PLM. - AThe experience of Amadori Group

The Amadori Group: The PLM solution implemented by Sinfo One allows centralised management of the innovation work-flow  A single repository for recipes also interfaces with ERP.
Interview with Sandro Salvigni, Head of Application Solutions of the Amadori Group.

An increasingly complex and competitive market added to a further problem du to  regulatory developments. These are increasingly stringent regulations governing checks data to be displayed on the label and traceability of the raw materials.  This is the new scenario in the sector in which the Amadori Group is one of the biggest (and best-known) brands in Italian agri-food. It specialises in poultry meat, with a large number of product ranges.

Established around 40 years ago in San Vittore di Cesena, in the province of Forlì-Cesena, today the group has a turnover of around 1.2 billion Euro (2016 figure) and numbers over 7,400 staff members, distributed throughout six poultry feed factories, six incubators, six transformation and processing factories, 19 branches and agencies throughout Italy, three logistical platforms (Cesena, Teramo and Santa Sofia) and over 800 farms.

Italy is the main market of reference. More countries are Greece, Spain, Portugal and England.  Its goal is to maintain its market position. The Group purpouse is to use more and more technology in production: the ERP and PLM systems are enabling Amadori to compete in an increasingly complex market, and to manage product innovation.  The Group runs around 300 innovation projects per year, with over 2 thousand product codes.

Amadori offers a vast range of traditional and processed poultry products, as well as red meat, to meet the needs of increasingly demanding consumers who are careful about what they eat. 

 “Food industry has always paid close attention o these aspects, including issues concerning how the recipe is managed, because we have to maintain a traditional approach whilst ensuring the control over the process gives the consumer certain guarantees,” the manager explains.

 

Innovation led by technology

70% of the end products coming out of Amadori Group factories are of the traditional kind (namely products in which the anatomical cut of the meat is recognisable), whilst 30% is processed products: needless to say, the two types of product feature different innovation dynamics. The company works on different kinds of innovation: “On the one hand is ‘evolutionary’ innovation, such as new format or packaging solutions; on the other hand is more disruptive innovation with regard to the portfolio we present to the market”.

How does the innovation process, which is developed with the crucial help of technology, actually come about? “We keep a close eye on food trends, because the competition is not just from players in our sector: to remain competitive you have to earn consumer trust. Today consumers can choose from a vast number of products, and not just meat alone”, Salvigni states.

“The innovation we offer is ongoing, and to help us maintain it to best effect we have adopted Agile, the PLM (Product Lifecycle Management) solution, which Sinfo One implemented. The system provides an overview of the entire process and involves every department in full in the innovation process. For example, in addition to Research and Development, Quality, Marketing, Production and the Supply chain are also involved”, Salvigni stresses. The process differs depending on the type of innovation involved, but in any case it requires the participation of individuals that handle different aspects: around thirty people spread out over seven departments. Each of the individuals “can manage the data their profiles allow them to modify”.

In order to achieve ‘digital’ innovation management, it has been necessary to create new solutions that have brought changes to a process which, prior to 2013 – when Sinfo One first started implementing PLM on finished products and recipes, a project consolidated in 2014 with integration with ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) – was managed in a “fragmented” way precisely because “lots of people were involved”, and they are used to using more traditional instruments, meaning they were less controlled.  “Step-by-step control now makes for far better centralised governance. This helps ensure products reach the market on time”, the Amadori Group manager confirms.

Centralised recipe management

One of the most “fragmented” processes, Salvigni recalls, is that of managing recipes used for creating innovative new products. In addition to particular cuts, these call for new ingredients, flavourings and, at times, specific systems. “Before adopting Agile, the recipes were managed in different systems. Now they have been concentrated into a single tool which is integrated with Oracle's JD Edwards ERP management software, which acts as Master Data”.

How does the process work? “The recipe is created straight on the PLM, and gives rise to an approval process that involves various departments, with people who are asked to validate it; at that point the information is sent to the ERP, and is then ready to be used in the factories”, clarifies the Head of Application Solutions at the Amadori Group. The precise management of all the semi-processed goods entering the production process has been another important point of the initiative: proper management of these codes in the recipes (many of which can be used as an alternative) is vital for guaranteeing production flexibility, whilst ensuring the product quality is maintained.  This is no small benefit if we bear in mind that the meat sector “has very low profit margins”, and is accordingly required to reduce waste and inefficiency to a minimum”. In PLM it is also possible to have an overview of all the characteristics and components of the product: the ingredients in the recipe, the semi-processed items which are involved etc. Any changes depending on the work-flows involved are sent for approval to the members of the chain, who can interact even when they are on the move.

The PLM  project implemented by Sinfo One started 4 years ago, today we centralised all management of label information on the PLM as well. “Our aim is to create a single repository in the form of the PLM for all the nutritional information , ingredients and allergens. From this repository we can then extract information for various applications, including the ERP, as required”, the manager explains. For a company like Amadori, this means having real visibility of every ingredient used to make the recipe: “We are taking all the data, which until recently had been gathered in a destructured way, and we are entering it into the system. We expect this to yield benefits in terms of control, ease of access to information and speed for managing changes.”

It is a significant turning point for the Amadori Group. PLM not only provides a complete and up-to-date vision of the process, but it also makes possible to view the “data logging for the recipe”. “This is a very useful aspect. Particularly  Quality can monitor when a given recipe was introduced, and how it has evolved over the course of time”, Salvigni notes. The possibility of offering “top management innovation data with a precise snapshot of projects, both those underway and those that are finished, is by no means secondary. This also gives visibility of who is doing what, and of the launch dates scheduled for each new product.”

 

Respecting regulations

Another issue in Food sector is the frequent changes in legislation and regulations that differ according to the market concerned.

PLM can help the company guide the change process in the fastest and safest way possible (such as rapidly identifying which recipes are affected by the change, and accordingly which finished products and which recipes have to be updated).

The Amadori Group's decision to be supported by Sinfo One and adopt Oracle Agile began when Salvigni took part in an Oracle event in San Francisco.

Sinfo One is the gold reference Oracle partner for the whole of the EMEA region for the Agile for process solution. “We have decided to embark on this initiative, and as Sinfo One is already our partner for implementing Oracle JD Edwards”. “We created a project that started out by analysing our requirements and the approval work-flows of the process, as well as the aspects that needed to be managed. In so doing we managed to customise the solution to meet our own specific requirements”, the manager recalls. He stresses that “integration with the ERP was crucial, because we didn't want to create the umpteenth information island”: “Today the new products, recipes and semi-processed products are created in the PLM. The data is only sent to the management software at the end”. Which all makes for an efficient process with no time wasted.