SAFE leads the way after successful migration to award-wining ERP software

A ground-breaking project that is delivering the benefits of award winning cloud-based software to streamline fruit production, supply chain tracking and accounting at SAFE is near completion.

“It has been a huge task to migrate to Openbravo but we are almost there and I am confident that by the end of April the migration will be virtually complete”, said SAFE CFO Quentin Scott who has headed the project team assembled for the migration.

Openbravo is an award winning, open source, Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) solution developed in Spain and used in businesses in more than 60 counties.

The module-based software is aimed at mid-size to large organisations that want a complete solution to manage their entire business as well as specific solutions to improve existing systems.

It is the first time Openbravo has been used in in fruit sector in South Africa.

The software’s was developed by two employees of the University of Navarra in Spain, Nicolas Serrano and Ismael Ciordia- to streamile the universities’ administration.

According to Quentin, the software allows SAFE to monitor and track freshly-harvested fruit on its journey from the farm to the packhouse, then to shipping and landing at destination ports from where it is transported to buyers.

“The ability to track production, packing and shipping and delivery to port of destination at this detailed level – pulling through each stage as it happens in real time – brings a number of advantages and efficiencies to our business.

These include invoicing, continued auditing and greater detailed monitoring of our entire production and supply chain process,” he said.

The fact that it is cloud-based makes it so much easier for information to be collated in real time – rather than, as in the past, each “station” reporting independently in their own time to a central control.

“Because Openbravo is modular we can add to the system as we need to”, says Quentin. “The fact that we can also pick up errors in the inputting process  almost as same time that as they are made, and correct them is a huge advantage.”

The migration to Openbravo began early last year with the “onboarding” of General Ledger and master files, phase two, logistics was completed earlier this year and the final process of adding the warehouses, cold rooms and pack houses into the system is now virtually complete.

According to Samantha Hanreck, ICT Manager of Business Systems at SAFE, the support of Eugene van Vuuren of Qbix Consulting, Cape Town, to customise Openbravo for SAFE was invaluable.

In her praise of Openbravo Samantha said, “Previously we had farm managers and business unit mangers, from harvesting to packing and warehousing individually capturing data which was then recaptured at head office. Now thanks to Openbravo we can all be on the same page at the same time.

This means, she added, that head office has the most up-to-date information about any aspect of the business at their fingertips.

“In conceptualising the migration of SAFE to Openbravo, I aimed to make SAFE more efficient business,” says Quentin Scott.  “It is early days, but I can already see the benefits we have achieved thanks to this new resource.”

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