CREALIS® simplifies business processes

Toyota Material Handling Deutschland GmbH (TMHDE) is optimising the tender process by introducing the standardised sales configurator for the three sales pillars: direct sales, key account and independent dealers

TOYOTA MATERIAL HANDLING DEUTSCHLAND GMBH

Toyota Material Handling Deutschland (TMHDE) with head office in Isernhagen near Hannover is the local representative of the world‘s largest manufacturer of trucks, Toyota Industries Corporation. TMHDE offers the BT and Toyota brand trucks and corresponding services through dual field sales. The product range extends from hand pallet trucks to tractors and forklifts with all kinds of drive through to warehouse management systems.

THE CHALLENGE

Toyota Material Handling Deutschland has a closely meshed sales network, which includes six Toyota Stapler Centers, eight branch offices and 17 dealers. Since 2016 warehouse technique equipment and other products can be purchased via online shop.
In 2011 the idea developed of introducing one product configurator for different product types with their variants and replacing the existing collection systems. The configurator is to be available online and offline. Decision makers considered it to be very important that the truck data can be modelled and updated very flexibly in-house and without any external assistance. This relates to incorporating technical modifications or price increases as well as adding new types of equipment.

THE PROCESS

The project was completed using the ORISA configurator CREALIS®. This contains knowledge-based software tools to manage product data and the configurator to configure products with a variety of variants. Staff from Toyota were able to acquire their first practical experiences modelling a product during a joint preliminary project. The result was extremely positive, which led to the other models from the range on offer from TMHDE also being consistently incorporated into the configurator. With the completion of this modelling work, 75 % of the daily business can now already be processed using fast, fault-free and convenient IT-aided tender preparation. It was obvious to also integrate Toyota‘s „Business Solution“ division‘s areas of responsibility, such as service, financing and leasing, into the overall solution next. Other processes, such as the part exchange of used equipment, leasing calculation and credit check, were also integrated parallel to this. At the end of the project phase, the different requirements dealers had of the configurator and the respective IT environments on site had to be considered.

THE OUTCOME

Sales has been working fully with the CREALIS® product configurator since April 2013, which quickly met with the employees‘ approval. Following the rollout and initial experience with the product configurator in day-to-day business, there has been a clear quality gain with offers and orders. A flawless offer is now reaching customers in no time at all. The number of queries
regarding subsequent order processes also dropped rapidly. In addition, roughly 94 % time is saved when preparing an offer for several items of equipment including their financing. The sales of one product group was in fact almost doubled. Price management and the credit approval process are shown in full and in accordance with the different requirements of dealers within the sales configurator. Dealers have a product configurator geared to their requirements at their disposal. Generally, both the configurator versions use the same model data and basic prices for the equipment. As a result, independent dealers are also able to quickly provide their customer with a tender at any time thanks to online and offline access. 295 models are currently incorporated in the truck manufacturer‘ s product configurator at the moment, which are used to determine the price of used machines. Roughly 240 model variants can be selected using the configurator and ordered at one of the Toyota production sites.

THE OUTLOOK

„Here in Germany we were the first Toyota Material Handling Europe sales branch office to use this kind of configurator successfully and are therefore assuming a certain pioneering role,“ reports Stephan Kaufmann.
„We are very happy as we have achieved our goals. With the assistance of the product configurator all the divisions and areas of responsibility, such as long-term leasing, part-exchange of used equipment, credit check and discounting can be done in an online and offline version. In the meantime, approx. 15,000 datasets are available for the product configurator.
The original objective was to do 75 % of the tender preparation using the configurator, today we are in fact achieving more than 90% with the additional mapping of the Business Solution division in the system. All that is left to conclude is that we are very well positioned for the future. Even more smaller areas of responsibility can be improved with the help of the configurator. For example, we are thinking about making our customers offers for short-term leasing too. Simplified handling is being considered in key accounts, e.g. the listing of several leased machines in the key account business,“ summarises Günter Simonis, Key Account Director and member of the executive board at TMHDE.
Toyota is planning another potential business with financing in after-sales over the next few years. Customers can expect a full range for equipment, service and financing in future.

„There are significant time and cost savings as well as an increase of sales and competitiveness.“

- Günther Simonis, Head of Key Account and member of the management board of TMHDE

The project in figures

94%

time saving in the offer process

90%

offer processing with the configurator

250

internal and external user

49

independent dealer user

A summary of the customer benefits:

  • Huge time and costs savings thanks to quick feasibility checks and
    tender preparation

  • Easy to modify during the tender phase

  • Self-explanatory and simple to learn configurator operation

  • An appearance that wins over customer‘s trust

  • Huge time and cost savings wtithin sales and production

  • Individually configured representation of any equipment operating hours