Digging in for better development

The company runs an ambitious NPI programme that touches 10 departments, and needed to automate workflow, document management and information sharing - particularly to catch errors or faults in prototypes. Paper action sheets that log errors tend to get lost as they work their way around departments. Komatsu's existing systems couldn't help, so Genisys, its document management IT supplier, pointed to business process management (BPM) technology firm Metastorm. Now there's a collaborative environment that alerts relevant parties early, and automatically tracks resolution across departments. It also provides users with visibility so they can see the status of electronic action sheets and work in progress at any time on 'watch list' dashboards. Metastorm BPM has been integrated with Genisys, and also reads data from Komatsu's ERP. The results: speed, efficiency, discipline, structure and accountability throughout the processes. Komatsu says it's now moved on to harnessing the system to improve efficiency across other areas of operations. Next up will be procurement quotation approvals, which will again be integrated with ERP. And the firm will then move on to compliance management, particularly around Sarbanes-Oxley.