Car group streamlines its data management
Inchcape to use performance management technology
Automotive services group Inchcape is installing performance management technology to reduce its use of paper and improve business intelligence.
The company has 90 car dealerships across the country, selling brands such as Mercedes, Toyota and BMW.
Chief financial officer Connor McCormack says the organisation’s old processes involved a lot of paperwork and manual rekeying of information.
‘Each dealership had a standalone operating system, and information was transferred from it to a central database monthly,’ said McCormack.
‘I received a rainforest of paper, such as daily, weekly and monthly reports, which offered very little business insight.
‘Each dealer also has different requirements. For example, our Ferrari dealer might sell five premium cars a month while the BMW dealer might sell 250.’
Supplier IM Group has built a data warehouse to accommodate online management information and is implementing business intelligence applications.
Inchcape spent almost 10 months building the interface between the operating system and the data warehouse and testing the technology.
McCormack says savings in paper and binding alone will be enough to pay back capital costs..
The programme will go global after the UK rollout.
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