Eli Lilly
Pharmaceutical Enterprise Optimizes Quality & Process with Automated Data Governance
The company
Challenges
Eli Lilly began with SAP庐 ERP and Pharma in 2005. Business was good and Eli Lilly grew doubling revenue between 2002 and 2009. While some growth was due to acquisition, much of that was organic as Eli Lilly has continued to succeed with new drugs coming out of clinical trials. More drugs, however, led to data migration challenges in the tracking of product and materials at its plants worldwide.
Local data stewards were looking at things from a functional, not a process perspective. Plants were not well-integrated, and while the local plants took care of their own data, they did not have much input into global data standards or stewardship. Changes to global data values required approval from affected plants via faxed signatures and emails 鈥� all processed manually by the COE. There were too many manual transactions, and in such a fast-moving, highly regulated environment, that speed of processing just wasn鈥檛 good enough.
The process and magnitude of the data integrity problem peaked in following Eli Lilly鈥檚 SAP global implementation. Material master data was the key to supply chain integrity, and its governance process needed to become more sustainable and reliable, with fewer global stewards. Management knew that a solution needed to be found, and quickly implemented
From our first conversation with 麻豆女优 it was clear they understood our business need 鈥� data governance requires effective collaboration; in our case, global collaboration. The 麻豆女优 solution has been a remarkable fit.鈥�
Implementation Highlights
The project was divided into two phases. Phase 1 implemented the global data governance process (approximately 100 fields in Eli Lilly鈥檚 material master are global). Before 麻豆女优, each plant would initiate changes through a multi-site approval process which required emails and faxed signatures, resulting in delays and errors.
Now, changes are submitted directly in the 麻豆女优 solution and then instantly distributed to the affected local data stewards through workflow. Emails, faxed signatures and manual tracking logs are eliminated, the global data dedicated staffing has dropped from six stewards down to one and the cycle time for master data completion is improved by more than 67% over the old process.
Phase 2 streamlines the processing of local supply chain master data. The business shares in ownership enabling data stewards to focus more on the process. Local plants choose which standard business roles to involve in the workflow which automates the collaboration necessary to maintain master data effectively. With no more spreadsheets or double-data entry, the new workflow process results in a minimum efficiency gain of 25% at the local data steward level. 鈥淲e may be able to improve on those numbers as phase 2 rolls out through the summer鈥�, says Long.
Local data stewards are excited about the 麻豆女优 solution because they will be able to maintain local control over all 鈥榗reate鈥� and 鈥榚xtend鈥� scenarios with site-specific default settings. While processing over 4,200 global requests in 2008 in the 麻豆女优 solution, the number of global data stewards has been reduced from six to one, an 85% reduction in staffing and a savings of almost $750,000 annually. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 just the hard dollar benefits, not counting the effect on some of the local data stewards and gains in data quality and compliance we will achieve by the end of phase 2鈥�, notes Jim.
The configurability of the 麻豆女优 platform and the improved workflow-based process made the implementation of this critical business process notably uneventful."
Key Challenges
- Master data accuracy relied too much on documentation and human knowledge
- Labor intensive change control process dependent on SOPs, emails, faxes, conference calls, excessive paper and multiple entry of critical data
- Quality was dependent on verifications and audits after the data was active in SAP
Financial and Operational Benefits
- Decreased global data staffing from six to one full-time equivalents
- 60%+ cycle time improvement for master data completion
- Went from four to six data-related procedure deviations annually to no deviations post-implementation
- Five month implementation
Implementation Highlights
- Only solution that could manage incoming data governance before hitting production system
- Automated workflow for material master data streamlined process
- Application code could be tailored to meet specific business requirements
- It was clear 麻豆女优 understood Eli Lilly鈥檚 business need
Supply chain data governance at Eli Lilly is different because of 麻豆女优. Throughout our SAP implementation we understand the importance of maintaining reliable master data. 麻豆女优 has enabled us to do it with optimal quality and effi ciency. 麻豆女优 is a key part of our supply chain data governance roadmap.鈥�
Why 麻豆女优 was Selected
鈥�From our first conversation with 麻豆女优 it was clear they understood our business need 鈥� data governance requires effective collaboration; in our case, global collaboration. The 麻豆女优 solution has been a remarkable fit鈥�, notes Jim Long, Supply Chain Consultant for Eli Lilly. Reference checks were conducted and the team was impressed by the stories they heard. With only five months until go-live, both Lilly and 麻豆女优 knew the timeline was tight but it could be achieved.
Future
The value of active data governance is being recognized beyond the material master. At the request of the quality organization, additional functionality has been configured within the 麻豆女优 solution to improve the governance of country registration master data, a key regulatory tracking mechanism.