C A S E S TU DY
SFI Speeds Response Times and Business
Growth with aPriori
More accurate and timely project quoting sets SFI
apart from its competition.
COMPANY: SFI – Steel Fabrication Inc.
VERTICAL: OEM Parts Manufacturing
OFFERINGS: Contract Design,
Development, Supply and ValueAdded Services
LOCATION: Memphis, TN
Since its founding in 1956, the company has grown to become the leading OEM parts
manufacturer in the nation. Today it employs over 600 skilled professionals and operates
three locations in Memphis, Tennessee; Conway, Arkansas and New Boston, Ohio. Together
these facilities provide over one million square feet of state-of-the-art production space fully
dedicated to steel fabrication solutions. This enables SFI to offer a full spectrum of process
operations, including press brake, roll forming, coil processing, laser cutting, stamping,
welding, machining, powder coat painting and assembly. Whether an OEM needs press
braking capability up to 28 feet, stamping presses up to 2000 tons or a 5 axis machining center
to handle a 40 ton part, SFI has all the capabilities to handle it quickly and efficiently.
EMPLOYEES: 600
“ R esponse time is key. Most customers
are looking for a quote that’s in budget
with a supplier they can trust and can
count on vs. the lowest possible quote.
It’s not always about the best price. It’s
about the best price/value/ reliability.
”
BILL LERMAN
PRESIDENT, SFI
BACKGROUND
SFI (Steel Fabrication Inc.) provides contract design, development, supply and value-added
services for medium to heavy gauge components to a select group of original equipment
manufacturers (OEM) in the agricultural, automotive, construction, industrial, transportation
and defense industries. This includes welded parts for commercial automotive manufacturers
and vehicle sub-frames for the U.S. military.
THE CHALLENGE
For any contract manufacturer, accurate and timely project quoting is a critical success factor. It
can make the difference between winning and losing business and making and losing money.
And like many others, SFI’s estimators used its own unique blend of different cost calculators,
spreadsheets and off-the-shelf cost management tools. It was all very manual and time
consuming. In most cases, SFI’s Cost Estimators had to analyze a series of 2-D drawings and
C A SE ST UDY
SFI and EMD
One of SFI’s customers is EMD,
the world’s largest builder of
diesel-electric locomotives for all
commercial railroad applications:
intercity passenger, commuter,
freight, switching, industrial and
mining.
SFI estimates large lots of parts for
EMD — large power train weldment/
oil pans. Turn around time would
have been very difficult without
aPriori. Previously, SFI would have
taken weeks to run around. Now, it
can do it in a couple of days.
Additionally, EMD was adding
components to parts previously
submitted for bid. EMD provided the
prints and SFI was able to go into
aPriori, quickly assess the differences
in parts, make the changes and
re-run the estimates. It was 30 mins.
vs. half a day.
SFI has also compared the weld
rates coming out of aPriori vs. those
submitted by welders and they are
virtually the same. The time tradeoff
is tremendous — a couple of hours
in aPriori vs. a couple of days to get
the estimates back from the welders.
then add in each, different attributes, runs rates, parts and labor costs. A big project with 500
different parts could takes weeks or more to quote. In some cases, SFI was getting 3-D models
from customers and then taking the time to turn them into 2-D prints. This created a lot of
unnecessary extra work and extended the quoting time frame from days to weeks.
All this manual effort meant more time spent responding to customer quote requests, more
overhead, difficult tradeoffs on priorities and even “no-quoting” some jobs which negatively
impacted potential future business. SFI’s estimating team felt it was always playing catch up.
Every customer wanted their quotes yesterday because they were likely already behind on
their own schedule.
THE SOLUTION
Sale engineers and cost management expert Hashim Alsaffar joined SFI in September 2010.
At that time, SFI was piloting a new product cost management solution from aPriori. He
remembers hearing about it when he was interviewing and he was intrigued.
“With aPriori, SFI said it could quickly and accurately cost out any part or product from a
CAD model. It was very compelling to me as a candidate and I saw a lot of potential with the
capability. If it did what they said it could, we could really accelerate our response time and
accuracy on project quotes. It seemed like a really big competitive advantage.”
Since then, Alsaffar has become the go to person at SFI for all things related to aPriori.
“With aPriori, we get ahead of the whole process,” says Alsaffar. We can respond more quickly
to customer requests for quotes, respond to more requests overall, and equally important,
see immediately whether or not a job is really in our sweet spot. This is good for both SFI and
the customer. It makes us a better, value-added supplier because aPriori makes our team and
our customers more knowledgeable about the requirements of a project. It also has a positive
effect on the customer's overall time to market.”
The key is aPriori’s ability to quickly analyze any part or product from a CAD model and
break it down to the lowest possible level of cost detail. aPriori also provides complete CAD
independence. It can work with 3D CAD models generated by any major CAD modeling
system on the market today, including: Pro/ENGINEER, CATIA v5, Siemens NX, Solidworks,
SolidEdge and Inventor to name a few. So, no matter what type of CAD model the customer
sends, aPriori can quickly open that model and generate a cost estimate in seconds. You don’t
even have to own a license of the source CAD system to open the model in aPriori.
“The system can also be used for prototyping and rough quotes,” adds Alsaffar. “Many times,
customers need a rough quote to see if you’re qualified to bid on a specific project. aPriori
makes that really fast and easy. Then that quote may need to be updated with additional
information. It’s just a quick change in aPriori to update the finer details; e.g., materials,
tolerances, etc. If you start a job in aPriori, you can update it and finish it seamlessly. Estimators
never need to start over when a job changes. It all takes a fraction of the time it would take
without aPriori.”
According to Alsaffar, some companies are still hesitant about providing 3-D models for fear
of giving away too much information, but when they understand how much more quickly
they can get a quote back, they usually change their minds. Other companies simply have
not incorporated 3-D models into the quoting process, but SFI is seeing that change now
2
C A SE ST UDY
About aPriori
aPriori software and services generate
hard-dollar product cost savings for
discrete manufacturing and product
innovation companies. Users include
some of the leading manufacturers
in Europe and North America.
Leveraging aPriori’s real-time product
cost assessments, employees
in engineering, sourcing and
manufacturing make more-informed
decisions that drive costs out of
products pre- and post-production.
As a result, manufacturers launch
products at cost targets, maximize
savings in re-work projects and never
overpay for sourced parts.
To learn more about aPriori and its
product cost management solutions
and services., visit www.apriori.com
or call 1.978.371.2006. To see an
overview demonstration of aPriori,
click here.
that customers see the time to market benefits. In some cases, purchasing departments that
have put out standardized bid packs with 2-D drawings object. Then they start to understand
the difference in response time and the time they have to spend themselves, and it changes
their minds. Another factor – it’s easy for SFI’s estimators to tell if a 2-D drawing provided by
purchasing has come from a 3-D drawing. When they do, they just request it.
Alsaffar also sees it as part of a larger trend. “Engineering students coming out of school these
days are all trained in 3-D. They are comfortable using 3-D tools. Purchasing will get there as
well as they understand the real benefits to their business.”
THE RESULTS
In SFI’s business, they have a simple motto — ‘1st in, 1st to Win.’
“Response time is key,” says SFI president Bill Lerman. “Most customers are looking for a quote
that’s in budget with a supplier they can trust and can count on vs. the lowest possible quote.
It’s not always about the best price. It’s about the best price/value/reliability.”
While aPriori is largely invisible to SFI’s customers, it has an important domino effect on SFI and
its customers’ overall time to market.
•
SFI delivers an accurate quote back to the customer faster
•
The customer is able to make an outsourcing decision faster and with more confidence
•SFI’s engineering teams can use the information available in aPriori — routing, parts, etc.
to get a head start on the sourcing and production planning.
The time to market benefit to the customer is dramatic and really sets SFI apart in its ability to
serve its customers.
With aPriori in full use at SFI, things are a lot less hectic in the estimating department and SFI
is able to stay ahead of customers and their needs. Instead of two or three people working to
deliver a single estimate, one person can handle an estimate in a fraction of the time. This leads
to greater consistency and accuracy in the estimating process, especially when incorporating
changes to design and other specs that impact the cost.
Today, SFI is the only Fabricator with aPriori and it uses it as a differentiator throughout its
business - pre-sale, post-sale and in the quoting and engineering process. It plans to expand its
use of aPriori with additional training. “It’s really quite easy to use,” comments Alsaffar. “All you
really need is some experience with 3-D modeling and Windows. It’s very straightforward.”
300 Baker Avenue
Concord, Massachusetts 01742
Tel:978-371-2006
Fax:978-371-2008
[email protected]
www.aPriori.com
© 2013. aPriori. All rights reserved. aPriori and
aPriori Technologies are registered trademarks
of aPriori Technologies Inc. All other trademarks,
registered trademarks or service marks belong to
their respective holders.
3