Case Study

When Yamaha Motor UK realised that it needed to update its IT system to improve business processes, it turned to the expertise of Life IT to provide solutions that would help to reduce workload and running costs, whilst delivering increased productivity.

Yamaha Corporation

Yamaha is a well-known global company, founded over 100 years ago in 1889. Its roots began in manufacturing musical instruments, but with its technological expertise it moved into many areas of business including manufacturing audio & visual products, computer/network equipment, electronic devices, sporting equipment and auto components.

Yamaha Motor UK

Yamaha Motor UK’s headquarters are located at Brooklands, Weybridge – the home of the historic Brooklands racing circuit. From there all marketing, sales and service support activities for its motorised products are coordinated. Yamaha Motor (UK) Ltd has 3 sales divisions that service the following product groups: motorcycles, marine products & power products

Each division sells its products via a network of franchised dealers, managed by dedicated Area Sales Managers, who are individually responsible for between 20-35 dealers. The dealers and sales
divisions are in turn supported by Service, Accounts and Computer Services. Depending on the time of year and season, an average of 2,500 units are sold each week, excluding accessories and spare parts.

Existing IT system

Yamaha uses the BPCS ERP application for Sales, Distribution and Financials. The sales team received sales reports from the BPCS system in hard copy on a monthly basis. However, these reports became quickly out of date and involved large amounts of paperwork. In addition, there is a bespoke Customer Care application called Ycare, containing information on customers
from each stage of the purchase. The Service Division handles customer relations, liaising regularly with the dealer for information on warranties and servicing.

Life's Solution

Yamaha’s IT solution was developed using a range of Lotus Software and hosted on an IBM iSeries 820 server. Products used in the development included:

	IBM iSeries 820 Server
	Lotus Domino Enterprise Server (Release 6.0.1 for OS/400)
	Lotus Notes 6 Clients (Release 6.0.1 Win32)
	LEI (Release 6.0.1 for OS/400)

The databases are hosted on Clustered Domino Servers, giving a high level of resilience and high availability.

Users access the system via a Lotus Notes client, enabling them to work offline and replicate data. LEI is used to extract data from the back end systems on a daily basis. Lotus Mail, Messaging & Calendars have been rolled out replacing a Novell system. Standard Domino security and authorisation ensures that information held in the system for one division is not available to other divisions. Selective replication ensures that each sales person only receives data relevant to them during replication.

At the design stage of the project Life worked with IBM to evaluate the data transfer options available for the solution. Life wanted an open standard, so that the system could receive information from many different sources and LEI was chosen for this purpose.

Business Benefits

Life worked with closely with Yamaha Motor to develop a Sales Force Automation System (SFAS), that would integrate the information held in its separate systems – improving communication, reducing paperwork and subsequently workload.

The SFAS provides both consolidated and detailed views of sales performance and stock levels across all divisions of the company, and is accessible to all parts of the business i.e. sales, finance
and customer services. The sales team can take the system with them to review stock and sales performance on dealer visits across the country. The replication functionality within the system provides them with up to date information before each meeting. The system is also able to alert the sales person to dealer credit issues and customer satisfaction feedback, which can then be reviewed during the meeting.

“The system ensures that we can have a consistent structure to the review meetings and the information gathered,” said Nick Batchelor, Divisional Manager of Computer services for Yamaha Motor UK. “This in turn gives us more accurate stock forecasting and a cleaner handover when there are changes in sales territory or sales person.” Because the system is integrated end to end, Yamaha Motor UK can respond with speed to enquiries. Centrally, customer services can more easily identify which dealers have specific products in stock, and can provide contact details and addresses to the potential customer.

“Life offered us a complete solution to our IT issues,” said Nick Batchelor. “The Life team ensured that they had a complete understanding of what we wanted our IT system to achieve, and was then able to deliver this through a professional, and very flexible service.”

This solution has enabled Yamaha to see instant and tangible benefits by:

	Reducing stock levels
	Improving customer care
	Increasing efficiency
	Enabling the sales team to work from anywhere
	Reducing paperwork
	Sharing sales and customer information throughout the company