Testimonial of Mr. Frederic Fortin, CMA, MGP, IT Development, Leggettood

Leggettwood was looking for a solution that would allow us to manage our corrective and preventive maintenance, purchases, and spare parts. INTERAL turned out to be a reliable solution with an outstanding implementation service. From an architectural point of view, the software was developped according to .NET standards, which allows us more than ever to adapt it to our needs and exchange data with our other applications. The report designer, INTERAL Reports, is an optional tool that turned out to be very useful in our project to satisfy the different people involved. Thank you to INTERAL's team.

Testimonial of Mr. Morched Khalfallah, MBA, CEO Société des Emballages du Sud (SES), Sfax, Tunisia

Beyond the software’s intrinsic qualities, our partnership with INTERAL gave us, and continues to give us the opportunity to acquire important general maintenance know-how. Immediate results following the system's implementation are perceptible mainly on four levels:

1. A noticeable decrease in the frequency of equipment breakdowns (approximately 30% over two years)

This was made possible after having set up equipment files, and particularly after having elaborated the maintenance tasks (description and frequency of the tasks) and having entered them into the software, PlanPro. PlanPro presently emits systematically—on a daily basis—the planned preventive work orders, and the corresponding tasks are generally carried out on the same day, or the following day at the latest. Thanks to the exhaustive study of preventive tasks—lubricating, cleaning, changing work parts, etc.—and to their being executed regularly, which was not the case before implementing the software, traditional breakdowns due to negligence of preventive tasks occur less and less often.

2. A note-worthy reduction in the amount of time necessary to restart a machine following an accidental breakdown

This effect has already been felt, mainly on two pieces of equipment that had been judged most important on the maintenance level—the corrugator and the converting machine. Thanks to the FMEA that was done under the supervision of INTERAL’s experts on these two machines, and to the breakdown diagnosis tool that ensued, it is now possible to reduce the breakdown diagnosis period for each machine, and, consequently, to reduce the time required to restart the machine for production.

The availability for these two most important pieces of equipment is thereby increased due to the breakdown frequency reduction, and also due to the reduction of downtime following accidental breakdowns.

3. A reduction of the inventory level and of spare part shortages

Thanks to the economical and technical analysis done on our stock of spare parts according to INTERAL’s methodology, we were able to identify on one hand parts that we stocked too much of—which we immediately stopped purchasing and even in some cases resold—and on the other hand, parts that we should stock more of. In our first phase, this exercise allowed us to streamline our inventory.

What’s more, with the automatic stocking management, purchase orders and order receptions are made possible with the InventPro module. The inventory of spare parts is entirely controlled and the risk of a shortage following a breakdown is almost reduced to zero.

4. Total control and regular tracking of maintenance costs (internal manpower, subcontracting, spare parts, etc.)

Thanks to a rigorous and systematic use of both PlanPro and InventPro modules, we can now follow maintenance cost and breakdown evolution, something that used to be impossible before implementation. The management chart that INTERAL helped us design allows us, with its technical and economical indicators, to give a precise idea of the evolution and performances of the maintenance department, and consequently, brings precious help in our decision making. Through these informed decisions based on meaningful numbers that are readily available, the maintenance department’s productivity, and therefore the company’s productivity in general, is automatically increased. An example of this direct effect on productivity can be demonstrated by the fact that the Technical Department is able to better allocate its human and material resources per machine or task depending on the nature of the breakdown and the different costs associated to them. For example, it can decide, at the end of the year, to subcontract or to stop subcontracting certain jobs to make things more profitable. Such a decision would not be possible without the tools at our disposition today following the implementation of INTERAL’s software.

In conclusion :

If I must summarize the effects of our partnership with INTERAL, I would say that beyond the opportunity to have access to such advanced technology, the major medium and long-term impact still remains the reduction of the company’s costs. Following this success with SES, we decided to repeat the experience with SAS (Société Alimentaire du Sud), another company in our group, whre we can also observed, with great satisfaction, the same positive results.