Darekon's CEO, Kai Orpo, points out that its former ERP system could no longer serve the company’s strategic ambitions. For Darekon, it was time to look onward and begin the quest to find the right ERP vendor. As a result, it was important for Darekon to find a robust ally with whom to take the journey together, so its strategic vision could be realized.

We asked Kai to explain how the company's quest for a new ERP system came into being.

We defined our digitalization strategy in 2018, and we noticed that our current ERP system couldn't fulfill those needs. That's why we decided to invest in a new ERP system. At the beginning of the project we sent our RFQ to 10 ERP system suppliers, and after the evaluation, we had three ERP systems on our shortlist. One of those was Monitor.

Kai Orpo also talked about their business rationale for finding the right ERP vendor.

We defined several business reasons before sending our RFQ to potential suppliers. The main business reasons were better efficiency and greater transparency for Darekon's processes than in our current system, as well as preparing our internal processes to meet our customers' and suppliers' digital demands. There are also waste elimination opportunities, through the ERP system, like cost savings through better management of inventory and the whole supply chain.

Kai Orpo also elaborated on the main reasons why it decided to choose Monitor as its ERP system vendor.

There were three main reasons why we chose MONITOR as our new ERP system.

• Firstly, its strong know-how of the manufacturing industry.

• Secondly, its vision of industry 4.0 supported our vision of that.

• Thirdly, it responded in the best way to our project requirements, like multi-site operations.

For the Darekon grand tour, we also paid a visit to the Haapavesi manufacturing site, where we got to meet Plant Director Antti Järviluoma.

Antti reports that MONITOR has been of great use for managing its daily operations.

MONITOR has helped our daily operations management by providing tools that help us follow up and monitor the situation on the shop floor. Working with MONITOR has been very fruitful. The daily operation follow-up is very straightforward with MONITOR. The MONITOR system is also very flexible, and it enables us to develop our daily operations.

In each plant, Darekon has invested significantly in the development of its daily operations in order to meet its customers' and suppliers’ tough demands. We continued our grand tour by visiting Darekon’s plant in Poland.

Slawomir Wawryk is leading the plant’s operations in Poland, Gdańsk. He let us know how important it is to lead with determination, and gain the commitment of Darekonians in order to sustain a culture of continuous development and focus on quality thinking.

To meet our high expectations and build customer trust, we need involved and dedicated staff. Our team is very skilled and experienced. We are focused on high quality and continuous improvement.

Slawomir goes on to say that it’s especially important for them that Monitor, as an ERP system vendor, continuously develops its system and thereby provides new functions that help Darekonians in their daily work.

We are glad to see that Monitor is still developing its system, which is consistent with Darekon's approach to continuous improvement.

Although only half a year has passed since the introduction of the MONITOR ERP system, we decided to ask what Darekon's CEO Kai Orpo thinks about the system, and whether they have already seen bigger returns on investment following implementation.

We have succeeded in decreasing our working capital due to better management of our internal processes. We are very happy with our decision to choose MONITOR as our ERP system.