Fast React Systems the Production Planning and Sourcing Software Provider for the Apparel, Footwear and Textile Industry wins TAASI Inc.

TAASI Inc. a leading specialist in the childrens apparel industry solve difficulties in managing domestic and off shore production planning and sourcing through the use of Fast React solution.

Philippine based TAASI, Inc and Supreme Baby Wear work as a package to provide customers with a complete end-to-end service that involves technical direction, sourcing of all products, project management and manufacturing services. The group specialises in childrens apparel for all seasons.

TAASI has built a reputation as a specialist in the childrens apparel industry and at times has struggled to keep up with its success. The company has doubled its turnover over the past 3 years and has grown from 3 employees in 1994 to over 60 presently (2003). TAASI offers worldwide sourcing without restriction, boasting relationships with suppliers in countries around the globe. This has enabled the group to position their sourcing of fabrics, accessories and manufacturing in the best location for their customers.

The TASSI Production Planning Business Challenge
TAASI, like most of the apparel industry, were faced with the continuing pressure of the market place to provide 100% service levels at shorter and shorter lead times. By necessity, this shifted their production planning emphasis to focus on maximum flexibility and the elimination of stock-outs and late deliveries by making the right orders, for the right products, at the right time. TAASIs management realised that they needed to re-assess how the production planning function was carried out and to look for a tool that would improve visibility, flexibility and responsiveness, support the decision making process and generate achievable schedules in a timely manner.

Mary Cunningham, President of TAASI Inc. comments, Production planning and scheduling have always been a vital element in maximising operating efficiency. Inefficient planning and unclear objectives can lead to significant increases in variable costs. We were experiencing difficulties in managing domestic and off shore production together with strong business growth, resulting in late deliveries and inefficiencies. Most of all, we were frustrated by the fact that we had no clear visible picture of all orders, thus we could not easily identify either problems or potential opportunities".

TAASI, were previously trying to deal with the day-to-day control of production planning, through the tools with which they were most familiar, invariably spreadsheets, but when faced with the demand for accurate production schedules, short production planning cycle times and predictable delivery they soon realised that spreadsheets could not deal with the increasing complexities of their business.

Our performance has always been good considering our rapid growth, but it became apparent that in order to maintain our competitive edge we needed a production planning solution that provided a visual picture of production and sourcing and would work as an early detection system by identifying potential problems in production allowing us to replan to avoid a late delivery. We turned to Fast React Systems for help with our production planning requirements." continued Ms. Cunningham

Fastreact the Production Planning and Sourcing Solution Provider
With significant experience and an outstanding reputation, for providing a range of Production Planning and Sourcing Solutions specifically designed for the apparel and textile industry, UK Headquarted Fast React Systems was selected for its excellent software function, strong graphical user interface and swift implementation and payback.

The TAASI Inc. solution from Fast React Systems provides a highly visual centralised production planning and sourcing view like a control tower", where the entire order book across all suppliers can be visualised on an easy to use planning screen. Supplier loading and order progress can be managed effectively through initial order allocation to country or region, followed by more detailed allocation to individual suppliers. The progress of all orders through critical path and production stages is shown on screen and any slippage or delivery threats are clearly identified in colour. For customer facing staff, the order book can be sorted by customer, by supplier, by product etc and filtered to focus on key information such as show me only the orders for this customer across all suppliers", show me only those orders where I have a pre-production critical path problem", or show me the availability of all orders for this specific product" for example.

Furthermore, using Fast Reacts new RAS technology, suppliers in remote locations will, in the near future, receive interactive schedules from the TAASI Fastreact system and will be able to provide updates of factory related critical path activities, plus production achieved on a regular basis. Even fabric suppliers will be able to interact to provide ex-mill dates. These interactive RAS schedules will be sent from the host system automatically on a regular and timed basis. Whilst Fastreact Web is also available, the RAS technology provided will be the appropriate solution for locations where Internet access can be poor.

"We considered several solution vendors, but only Fast React Systems could deliver both the production planning and sourcing business applications, along with the industry specific functionality that we needed in a single package, which could link easily to our existing systems. The Fastreact Production Planning and Sourcing solution is based on the best business practices of hundreds of Apparel companies and will enable us to re-engineer our business processes to further improve our production planning efficiency." commented Ms Cunningham.

The Fastreact Evolution solution was selected for TAASI. Inc and was installed and fully functional within two months on their current Microsoft SQL Server Database.

About the Fastreact implementation Mr William Hooley, TAASI Director responsible for systems commented After the first business analysis done by Fast React they changed the initial course that was set, identifying our unique business requirements their initial setup strategy was not going to be the best one for us. Fast React had no hesitation in identifying this and steering a new better course. The Production Planning and Sourcing Solution implementation and training course was concise and concrete. Learning the system was easy. The Fast React support staffs are excellent at solving issues; we truly believe this to be one of the strongest parts of their business"

The Results From The Fastreact Production Planning Solution

The new Production Planning and Sourcing Solution system from Fast React Systems has significantly increased visibility and coordination of activities within the TAASI business. It allows the company to resolve supply chain issues, allowing them to work to increase on-time delivery and reduce order lead-times, through its proactive approach and clearer picture of all operations. This heightened visibility into the status of all goods being planned, produced or sourced allows TAASI to quickly and easily respond to customer enquiries whilst sharing with suppliers the information required to more effectively manage their production processes.

Leveraging existing manufacturing information to facilitate production planning through the highly visual Fast React System, immediately benefited the production process. The production planning boards are used to ascertain whether or not a contractor is over capacity as given by the warning colours on the Fastreact planning board, whilst at the same time checking if orders are on time or delayed. Fastreact has provided a much more flexible and responsive solution. Quite apart from the significant time saving over our previous, cumbersome methods, we had to accept that our existing spreadsheet solutions were no longer capable of meeting our growing business needs in a competitive and rapid change environment." commented Ms Cunningham.

"By improving production planning and collaboration, using information from multiple supplier locations, we are now able to ensure coordination of effort by providing high level planning of local and offshore suppliers, ensuring that all pre-production events are completed on time and that production starts in accordance with the production plan. Thanks to Fast React Systems we are now in a position to spot late delivery situations before they become a problem, and recognise and correct production variances on a period by period basis" Ms Cunningham commented further.

Andrew Brown, Managing Director, Fast React Systems stated TAASI, Inc. provide customers with a complete end-to-end service that involves production planning, technical direction and sourcing of products from a large network of supplier companies in both the home country and overseas. The key challenge for Tassi was to achieve visibility and control of all orders within their large network of suppliers. Through Fastreact, the company now has clear visibility as to the current status of all orders in a visual format that allows them to significantly increase the effectiveness of their garment supply chain.

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About Fast React Systems
Fast React Systems are a leading provider of Production Planning and Sourcing Solutions for the Apparel, Footwear and Textile Industry. Production Planning and Sourcing Solution including Fastreact Enterprise, Fastreact Evolution, Fastreact Advanced Planning & Scheduling and Fastreact Sourcing.

Contact www.fastreact.co.uk or
email sue.parsons@fastreact.co.uk