Joint product development “kits” with customer/clients
Project
Duration: 4 months
Role in the project: Managing Director
Operational area, geographical:
- Brazil
- South America
- Germany
Company
Type: Mechanical engineering
Turnover: 40 Mio. EUR
Number of employees: 160
Description
A large part of the sales was generated by the spare parts business to the OEMs. These were visibly losing market share, as end customers were increasingly buying inferior quality locally because “the hose they needed” was not in stock at the OEM. The use of inferior goods reduced machine utilization. This led to a loss of image for the OEM.
In order to avoid the migration of end customers to third-party suppliers, end customers were offered previously non-existent “preventive maintenance” including the corresponding material at fixed prices. For this purpose, maintenance intervals and corresponding kits were developed together with the OEMs. The material was commissioned and sold as a kit to the OEMs, who could then offer the maintenance to the end customers.
Measures
- Problem analysis and definition of the actual situation by customers
- Development of different solutions together with customers
- Elaboration of a common approach and presentation of this to the end customer (mine operator)
- Contract and price negotiations
- Establishment of a “consignment warehouse” for “foreign material” on site
- daptation of processes, procedures and systems to the new business model
- Training of employees and customers
- Accompaniment of the first deliveries to the end customer for quality assurance
- Regular feedback meetings with customers at the end customer to increase and maintain service levels.
- Presentation of the business model internally and support of the rollout in other national companies (China and Australia)
Team
- Sales, Logistics & Production (Brazil)
- Tax office (Brazil)
- Logistics company (Brazil)
- Purchasing, marketing, sales and service departments of customers
Reporting
- Regular customer meetings
- Presentation to management in Germany
- Progress reports at the end customer with customers
Interfaces
- Management (Germany)
- Law firm, tax office, logistics provider (Brazil)
- Sales, logistics and production staff (Brazil)
- Customers & End Customers
Success
This was a win-win-win situation for all involved:
- 28% increase in sales
- The OEMs were able to reduce machine downtime, thus improving their image and retaining their customers.
- The end customers (mine operators) were able to increase their production due to the lower downtime.
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