Embracing digital transformation and advanced ERP solutions can help you build be a truly modern and highly competitive fabricated metals manufacturer.
Question is…are you ready?
As a small-to-midsize fabricated metals manufacturer serving large customers within complex global supply chains, how do you maintain preferred vendor status? The whole world is your competition so you need to step up to meet increasingly demanding customer expectations. Your customers will expect mass personalization with shorter lead times whether the order is large or small—without sacrificing compliance with their industry’s quality requirements. To meet these demands—despite a skills shortage and volatile material costs and availability—you’ve got to put digital transformation at the top of your agenda. Do you want to:
- Define the role of digital transformation in growing your business?
- Understand the capabilities you need to support your digital transformation journey?
- Define and implement best practices to support a digital transformation strategy?
Digital transformation is sweeping through the fabricated metals industry as manufacturers move to capitalize on the Internet of Things (IoT), advanced analytics, cloud technologies, artificial intelligence (AI), and more. Leading fabricated metals manufacturers see these new technologies as game-changers—enabling them to redefine business models, revolutionize internal operations, and improve the customer experience. This is how they thrive when profitability and growth depend on standing out to large customers looking to consolidate supply chains—even while macroeconomic forces lead to volatile material costs and a skills shortage. When effectively applied through every part of your fabricated metals operation, digital transformation gets you set for growth in every way, ultimately letting you take full advantage of an extended connected ecosystem of partners, suppliers, and customers.
![New ERP system]()
Understanding Digital Transformation
Digital transformation is a response to burgeoning issues within a global economy that is faster, more connected, and aggressively competitive. It is not an end destination or state of being, but a combination of applied digital technologies and processes that accelerate your business toward its strategic objectives and push it further along the Industry 4.0 track. The velocity and scale of technological change can feel as overwhelming and risky as leaping onto a high-speed train. Leaders may wonder how it’s even possible to harness the power of digital transformation when technology seems to become obsolete almost as soon as it arrives.
Instead of focusing on all the risks, possibilities, and benefits of new technologies all at once, first define your overall business goals. What do you hope to achieve in the next five years? Will you focus on attracting and retaining the right talent for success? Is quality management high on your agenda, as you look to minimize rework and respond more quickly and cost-effectively to compliance requirements from customers? Are you looking to transform inventory management, visibility of costs, machine utilization, and other capabilities critical to efficiency?
Once your business goals are defined, the digital tools that offer the greatest opportunity to achieve them will emerge. Those technologies can then become part of your growth strategy—steps you’ll take on your journey.
High-growth businesses are two times more likely than low-growth businesses to invest time in strategic planning. While many competing technologies profess to drive digital transformation, the
utility of any given digital solution depends almost exclusively on context—so you need to understand where you are in your digital transformation journey and how specific technologies will add value to your business. Against a backdrop of fierce competition and rapid evolution, this means identifying the areas in which you can make the smallest change for the largest return on investment. The starting point in the journey toward growth is to understand your market and business inside out.
To get started, you need to establish what works, what requires immediate attention, and where digital transformation can add real value. With your clearly defined growth vision, you are ready to set investment priorities for digital transformation. As a fabricated metals manufacturer you might focus initially on automating steps in the quote-to-cash process to meet compressed lead times, or on automating cost accounting and inventory management to better handle cost volatility, or on non-conformance management to improve quality control. You must take an honest look at which areas are your biggest hindrance to growth—and which areas offer the greatest opportunity for lasting success.
Let CompuData show you how Epicor can help you be a digitally transformed fabricated metals manufacturer. Contact us today!