SOLIDpower S.p.a. is a high-tech company which works at an international level specialized in designing and production of machineries based on SOFC Technology (Solid Oxide Fuel Cell). Founded in 2006, Solidpower is located in 3 different countries, with the headquarter in Mezzolombardo (TN) and two other branches in Switzerland and Germany. The company is on the market with 2 products: EnGEN – 2500 with 2,5KW potency and in Field Test phase, addressed to a residential and corporare segment; and BlueGEN, the first micro CHP system integrated in a thermal system with 1,5Kw of potency, addressed to retail market with a temperated climate or commercial users with 12.000 KWh.

Needs

SOLIDpower business goes beyond the national boundaries, both for the presence of offices in Germany and Switzerland and for the fact that the majority of the implementations are abroad: the need was to opt for an international ERP like Microsoft Dynamics NAV, which facilitates the optimization of operation at global level.

Solidpower realizes innovative products and for this reason R&D department have a strong importance in all the company areas. The challenge has been to use a international ERP system in a variable and dynamics context, finding for every process the right compromise between business solutions formalism and new needs.

Fundamental to reach the aim was the willingness of the management to follow the guidelines traced by a company model designed according to the standard of NAV.

Solution

The implementation of Dynamics NAV project begun in September 2013. After 16 weeks, in January 2014 the new ERP was already working for Finance, Manufacturing and Purchase departments.

Then, with fine tuning phase, which last all 2014 long, other project phases have been implemented, such as Quality and the Field Test installation, as well as integration with external system ad CRM, BI and Issue Tracking.

In the project Microsoft Dynamics CRM has been integrated through which allows to collect contacts and to undertake marketing actions.CRM has been interfaced both with the website of the company for the collection of contacts and with the new product site specific for EnGEN-2500, where user can enter data related to his consumption and to calculate ROI for a new installation or substitution of a boiler.

Next steps will be integration with PDM and web pubblication of tracking list of each EnGEN and BluGen to facilitate service activities.