Dyckerhoff AG: Spare Parts Management

Dyckerhoff AG, headquartered in Wiesbaden, Germany, is a global producer of cement and ready-mixed concrete.

The company is owned by the Italian Buzzi Unicem Group. With sales of more than €1.8 billion in 2007 and a total workforce of about 7,000 employees, Dyckerhoff is a trusted brand with 140 years in the industry. It called on Accenture to help it identify improvements in the management of its spare parts.

Since 2001, Dyckerhoff had faced strong challenges. A decline in demand in its mature markets accompanied by pressure on prices and rising production costs required an optimization of the organizational and structural efficiencies. In addition, the client recognized that the management of spare parts needed to be redesigned, starting from procurement and covering all processes such as long- and short-term planning, replenishment, storage and linkage of the various plants.

Working within an aggressive three-month time frame, Accenture teamed with Dyckerhoff to identify improvements in the management of spare parts. The project started by defining the most-suited fundamental approach in terms of roles and responsibilities of the various involved functions and departments. Based on this groundwork, the new processes and organizational responsibilities were detailed, resulting in standardized processes and procedures for the spare parts usage across eight locations throughout Germany and Luxemburg.

Little documentation of the various processes existed prior to the project. Hence, Accenture delivered a management handbook covering all aspects of the new handling of spare parts, including strategic and operational procurement, inventory strategy, master data management, order management and inventory handling.

This handbook enabled Dyckerhoff to establish common processes and standards across the company. The project produced tangible benefits in inventory optimization and reduced purchasing costs, setting Dyckerhoff onto the path to high performance.