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Lohr

LOHR is a privately-owned French group based in Alsace, near Strasbourg, which has been a world specialist in the design, manufacture and marketing of goods transportation systems for over 55 years. The LOHR group currently employs 1,350 people worldwide, has a development center with over 120 engineers and technicians, and plants in Turkey, Serbia, India, the United States and Mexico.

LOHR focuses on the following areas of expertise:

  • Urban mobility
  • Freight transport
  • Military vehicles
  • Shared mobility solutions

With the aim of driving the company forward, and faced with the obsolescence of its information system, the LOHR Group has chosen SAP solutions, and in particular SAP S/4HANA, and APPLIUM for its implementation. The LOHR Group launched a consultation in July 2020 to select a software publisher/integrator pairing with the qualities to support the company in its new growth dynamic.

The specifications were clear on LOHR’s objectives and ambitions for this project: to have a modern, integrated and communicative information system covering the PLM/ERP/MES triangle.

At the end of this consultation with the market’s leading ERP solution providers, in April 2021 LOHR selected SAP solutions, in particular SAP S/4HANA, and Applium’s integration services as part of a project management contract. Symbolizing the new impetus given to the company, the project has been christened ELAN.

There were several reasons why we chose SAP S/4HANA. First of all, the opinions of future users who appreciated the ease of navigation, the modern interfaces and ergonomic navigation, the integrated analytics but also the structuring modules such as project management.

Maria Podoprygolova
ELAN Project Director

The first phase of the project concerns France, with operational start-up scheduled for January 1, 2023.

The SAP solutions and modules selected are as follows:

  • SAP S/4HANA for 800 users
  • Production planning and scheduling with SAP S/4HANA Manufacturing for planning and scheduling
  • Optimizing cash management with SAP S/4HANA Finance for cash management
  • Supply chain digitization with SAP S/4HANA Extended Warehouse Management
  • Automated supplier invoice processing with SAP Invoice Management by OpenText
  • Electronic document management with SAP Document Access by OpenText
  • Change management and user support with SAP Enable Now

Thanks to SAP S/4HANA, we hope to be able to strengthen customer satisfaction, improve our internal processes, productivity and profitability.

François Lhomme
Chairman of the Management Board Groupe Lohr

Digital transformation – Accelerating transformation – Supply Chain

We are an international, family-owned, mid-sized group, and we needed a partner who could support us in our transformation, while taking into account our values and the singularities that are our strength.
From the very first discussions, Applium was able to understand our needs and, during the demonstrations, sketch out the solution to meet them, thus providing confirmation of its expertise.

Franz Rocquet
Chief Information Officer

The Applium teams are very proud and pleased with the confidence LOHR has shown in them by selecting them to implement SAP S/4HANA.

Beginning in April 2021, the collaboration between the LOHR and Applium teams has been built on trust and the willingness of the teams to contribute to a project that is as rich in terms of industrial, logistical and financial scope as it is in terms of the stakes for the company.

Alix Ponsada
Associate Director Applium

Film – Interviews with LOHR project leaders and players:

In this 3-minute film, the LOHR project managers and players explain why they chose SAP solutions and Applium, as well as their objectives and expectations for this major transformation project.

Testimonials – Area managers express their expectations of the SAP project:

Romain Denis
Project Manager

Romain talks about the expected benefits of S/4HANA as a single source of data and a cross-functional solution, as well as the quality of the SAP Fiori user interface and the ” In Memory ” power of the SAP Hana database.
He also mentions the SAP Enable Now solution, which facilitates user appropriation of the new solution and change management.

Anne Rohrbach
Head of Automotive Sales Europe

Anne talks about her expectations in terms of improving customer relations and making them more reliable. She expects SAP S/4HANA to help the LOHR Group librarianize its knowledge of the market and customer purchasing habits, optimize order management, secure payments, and also ensure better analysis of contract profitability.
The improved inter-departmental communication provided by the solution should make it possible to limit contingencies and streamline processes.

David Duval
IT Services and Business Area Managerde domaine IT services et commerces

As IT Manager, David expects SAP S/4HANA to deliver major benefits in terms of streamlining the exchange of information between departments and services, and providing a single repository. In other words, the aim is to do away with the spaghetti bowl of applications that the current information system represents.
SAP S/4HANA will be a major asset in the face of competition.

Laurent Robert
Quality Inspection Manager

Laurent explains that the choice of SAP S/4HANA is an opportunity to review the company’s processes, and that LOHR’s SAP users will benefit from improved ergonomics and faster execution thanks to the solution’s ability to automate daily tasks.

Norbert Eckert
General Manager, Lohr Service

Norbert’s expectations of SAP S/4HANA to improve after-sales service are numerous: automate tasks, improve activity planning, make data quality more reliable…
In fine, the implementation of SAP S/4HANA should enable LOHR teams to concentrate on the essentials: retaining existing customers and winning over new ones.

Valérie Gruardet
Finance Project Coordinator

For Valérie, the replacement of LOHR’s historical information system, which was closed and disintegrated, by SAP S/4HANA should bring many improvements: ability to steer the Group’s financial performance at any time and in an automated way, make data reliable and unified, improve internal control, correlate management control and accounting…
The numerous detailed reports offered instantaneously by SAP S/4HANA will enable LOHR managers to access detailed information concerning actuals, forecasts, budgets…