Diverse Markets, Specialist Expertise
With 40 production facilities around the globe and a market presence in over 100 countries, Jotun is a truly multi-national company. Expertise in four specialist paint and coatings segments has fueled impressive growth—and with it the need to manage complex and diverse operations across multiple segments and geographies.
Jotun develops, manufactures and distributes interior and exterior decorative paints to consumers and professionals. Its paint products protect and beautify several iconic buildings including the Eiffel Tower in France and the Burj Khalifa in Dubai. Jotun is also the world’s leading provider of marine coatings to the newbuild and maintenance markets; one in five of the world’s vessels have Jotun coatings applied. The Jotun Group’s protective coatings are used by the offshore, infrastructure, energy, and hydrocarbon processing industries, whilst customers of its powder coatings include manufacturers of appliances, furniture, architecture, general industries and pipelines.
Jotun began working with IFS in 2003, initially implementing IFS Applications components for financials, manufacturing, logistics management, procurement and maintenance in its Scandinavian operations. Since this successful introduction, it has steadily expanded its use of IFS to support and optimize business-critical processes to more than 30 countries worldwide.
Collaboration Solves Regional Challenges
Like most manufacturers, Jotun must control and monitor costs carefully, especially in light of global price volatility for key raw materials used in production, such as epoxies, titanium dioxide, copper and zinc. At the same time, the company also has to deal with complex cross-border legal and regulatory challenges, explains Jotun ERP manager, Trond Aune: “Operating in countries like Russia, Brazil and Turkey means we must carefully manage and comply with local legislation. By working with IFS R&D we have been able to create and progressively roll out a robust globalization package that enables individual territories to implement the global Jotun ERP system locally.”
Aune is also very clear about the wider value IFS adds to the global enterprise. “Jotun’s strategy is firmly centered around innovation and building sustainable business growth. Over the last 10 years the Group has achieved an impressive growth and we have used IFS to streamline our operations, standardize business operations and master data.”
How Can IFS Help Jotun Challenge the Industry?
Jotun’s current IFS implementation, IFS Applications 9, has over the years replaced some 15 legacy systems with a unified, fully-transparent ERP solution. The latest Jotun countries to benefit from IFS include India, Bangladesh, Spain, Italy, Turkey and South Korea—adds Aune, “Ultimately IFS will be deployed across 200+ sites in 40 countries supporting major aspects of the business, including strategic purchasing and warehouse barcode scanning.”
Streamlining Global Workflows, Saving Time
IFS ERP and other IFS solutions obviously support significant global savings alongside automation, digitization and the standardization of processes. An example of process improvement can be seen within Jotun’s complex business model of cross-border sales and invoicing where IFS is used for increased efficiency and digitalization of workflows. For Jotun’s main warehousing operations, implementing the IFS Warehousing Data Collection (WADACO) have with the help of mobile devices and bar code technology allowed for increased inventory efficiency and faster throughput.
Fredrik Olaf Kramer, Planner, a hands-on advocate, “I use IFS Applications to plan the paint production —130 recipes, which translates to 450 SKUs. In total the Vindal factory in Norway uses 1.800 SKUs. I like the clear intuitive interface, the adjustable themes and the ability to display all data across two screens makes my workflow faster, easier and saves me time. Every second counts when planning.”
Benefits Seen Using IFS
- Tight cost management, visibility and control e.g. for raw materials.
- Global ERP solution that can also accommodate regulatory and legal requirements for local counties and territories.
- Increased standardized business processes provide better control, greater efficiency, and enhanced global collaboration.
- Long-standing partnership and collaboration with IFS R&D supports innovation, growth and use of new technology by the Group.
About the Jotun Group
Jotun Group is one of the world’s leading manufacturers and developers of decorative paints and marine, protective and powder coatings. The parent company, Jotun A/S, is headquartered in Sandefjord, Norway, with a highly distributed and regionalized structure with hubs in Kuala Lumpur, Dubai and Shanghai. A matrix structure serves Jotun’s seven sales regions through 62 companies (including 40 factory production facilities) in 45 countries. Worldwide the Group employs over 9,800 employees. In 2018, total Jotun Group consolidated revenues were NOK 17.7 billion.
