Rick DaPrato This is Me

 Web References

1. 1. The Means to an Edge: End-to-End Supply Chain Integration - CIO Special Advertising Supplement

   www.cio.com/sponsors/110199_su - [Cached]

   Published on: 11/1/1999   Last Visited: 6/22/2001

   The technology is in place and we're now moving at warp speed , says Rick DaPrato , manager of the manufacturing systems group for Alpha Industries , a maker of semiconductors in Woburn , Mass.. Three years ago , Alpha was plodding along at a steady $75 million a year. The company was strangled by a 1980s enterprise resource planning ( ERP ) system that lacked the flexibility and functionality required to compete in the fast-changing semiconductor market. Today , revenues top $140 million and are on a pace to double again over the next several years.
   
   Two initiatives put Alpha Industries on this high-growth path. First , the company began an aggressive customer satisfaction program that included realtime customer access to order information.
   ...
   It's as if we have all our worldwide sales reps , suppliers , customers and distributors within our four walls , says DaPrato. The benefits of integrating with value chain partners are impressive , even at this early stage in the implementation process. We're a very customer-centric organization , DaPrato says. Prior to implementing Point.Man , we had an on-time delivery rate in the 50 to 60 percent range. Now , we're running in the high 90 percent range.. If customers or sales reps have any questions about products , prices or delivery status , they can log onto Alpha's Web site to obtain up-to-the-minute information directly from Alpha's EEA system. Links into the Federal Express system provide immediate delivery status for shipments that have left the factory. Soon , according to DaPrato , the online catalog at Alpha will be personalized to display only the product and pricing information appropriate to that customer. Time-to-market is a key measure in the semiconductor business. We use Point.Man's electronic engineering change management approval process , DaPrato says. Instead of passing paper from desk to desk , it's all done electronically.. The result is faster changes , less expense and improved customer service. Internally , Alpha has seen inventory turns rise , inventory levels drop and financial closes accelerate. all without a single on-staff programmer. I don't want to have programmers keeping bolt-on systems in sync , says DaPrato. That's why we look to our partner to provide the complete system we need to run our business.. Summing up , DaPrato says , The need for speed in this market has reduced our three-year vision to a one-year execution plan. Changes are happening in this market faster than we could ever have anticipated..
   
   Expected to grow 48 percent over the next five years , the SCM market will reach $18.6 billion by 2003-up from $2.6 billion in 1998.

2. 2. www.erp-people.com

   www.erp-people.com/~erp-people - [Cached]

   Published on: 9/15/1999   Last Visited: 8/31/2000

   That certainly was the case for Rick DaPrato, manager of enterprise information systems at Alpha Industries Inc. in Woburn, Mass. In fact, his company's integration experience was a joy, largely because of a choice he made when e-commerce was in its infancy. In May 1995, DaPrato's company replaced its outdated legacy system with Point.Man, a manufacturing-focused ERP system that be now offered by Mapics.
   
   DaPrato initially considered using one of the larger vendors, such as SAP or J.D. Edwards, but found that they were more interested in working with Fortune 500 companies than with smaller businesses like Alpha, which supplies semiconductors and integrated circuits to such companies as Motorola.
   ...
   We gave them the server and said, Here's the hardware ; configure it, " DaPrato says. They brought it back fully configured..
   
   And to DaPrato's surprise, the system worked. Customers in Europe and Asia, who had previously waited for as many as two days for order information, could access inventory data instantly. DaPrato estimated that the project-including hardware and the cost of software development-was less than $ 30, 000. And outsourcing e-commerce integration to a vendor freed up DaPrato's 16-member staff to spend more time supporting the company's 700 or so users.

3. 3. Waterstone Consulting News & Events

   www.waterstone.com/news/ar_sci - [Cached]

   Published on: 3/1/1999   Last Visited: 3/13/2001

   The technology is in place and we're now moving at warp speed , says Rick DaPrato , manager of the manufacturing systems group for Alpha Industries , a maker of semiconductors in Woburn , Mass. Three years ago , Alpha was plodding along at a steady $ 75 million a year. The company was strangled by a 1980s enterprise resource planning ( ERP ) system that lacked the flexibility and functionality required to compete in the fast-changing semiconductor market. Today , revenues top $ 140 million and are on a pace to double again over the next several years.
   ...
   It's as if we have all our worldwide sales reps , suppliers , customers and distributors within our four walls , says DaPrato. The benefits of integrating with value chain partners are impressive , even at this early stage in the implementation process. We're a very customer-centric organization , DaPrato says. Prior to implementing Point.Man , we had an on-time delivery rate in the 50 to 60 percent range. Now , we're running in the high 90 percent range.. If customers or sales reps have any questions about products , prices or delivery status , they can log onto Alpha's Web site to obtain up-to-the-minute information directly from Alpha's EEA system. Links into the Federal Express system provide immediate delivery status for shipments that have left the factory.
   ...
   Soon , according to DaPrato , the online catalog at Alpha will be personalized to display only the product and pricing information appropriate to that customer. Time-to-market is a key measure in the semiconductor business. We use Point.Man's electronic engineering change management approval process , DaPrato says. Instead of passing paper from desk to desk , it's all done electronically. The result is faster changes , less expense and improved customer service. Internally , Alpha has seen inventory turns rise , inventory levels drop and financial closes accelerate. all without a single on-staff programmer. I don't want to have programmers keeping bolt-on systems in sync , says DaPrato. That's why we look to our partner to provide the complete system we need to run our business.. Summing up , DaPrato says , The need for speed in this market has reduced our three-year vision to a one-year execution plan. Changes are happening in this market faster than we could ever have anticipated..