SPONSORED BY 123 INSIGHT
MAKING WAVES
Mako Board Sports Ltd, based in Semley, Dorset, realised how much
of an asset 123insight ERP software could be to the company after its
sister company had sung its praises
CONTRIBUTOR 123 INSIGHT
Mako are manufacturers of the Mako slingshot
jetboard, and its sister company, Rotron, make the
motors for said boards. Rotron had set up 123insight
previously and, as a new company (it was founded
in 2017), Mako was a clean slate that needed some
structure when it came to its operations.
Adam Collins, operations manager, noted that although it
had experience of 123insight’s capabilities through Rotron, Mako
had higher aims: “The short-term aim was to use the software as
Rotron did, so you just knew what was in stock. We knew from
the inception of this business that we wanted to capture all of
the data we produced. It would capture everything from when
raw material comes in, right through to the build, along with the
resource you need to carry out that build. We could also capture
all the data around clocking on/off , giving us the time to build
the boards. We’re trying to collect Big Data from all the diff erent
environments that we work in, bringing it all together, looking at
what we do, how we do it, and how we can improve. If we can
improve it, we can make ourselves better, faster, cheaper and
more profi table.”
Mako planned to implement and go live in under two months,
but Richard Bromley, Mako’s supply chain manager, had other
ideas: “We were quoted by our customer care manager that it’d
take about six to eight weeks, but we wanted it done by the end
of the year. We basically had three to four weeks in December to
get it built and running. In all honesty it was actually quite simple,
mainly because our company was new. We had no pre-existing
system in there, so we were starting fresh with 123insight.”
Like a duck to water
The company went live on 22 December
2017, just two weeks after commencing
training. Says Bromley: “We were ready to
go, and I was confi dent, but I also had a lot of
nerves around actually going live. You do all
this hard work, and you put a lot of pressure
on getting it working. I did a lot of testing,
copied the system, made a test database,
made sure it all worked, but it was that initial
‘when do I tell people I will switch it on and
go live?’ That was a very nervous stage, until
one day we just went with it. After about a
week or so I just told people ‘we’re live, and
it’s working’.”
As both Rotron and Mako are based at
the same location they also share a server,
with one benefi t being that they can share
licences between companies, in addition to
being able to increase or decrease licences
on a monthly basis as required. 123insight’s
service and repair functionality has proven
useful to the company.
Collins says: “We wouldn’t be able to
bring customer’s boards back and keep
traceability without Service and Repair. We
knew that customers would send products
back for service and repair, but we needed
28 www.manufacturingmanagement.co.uk
/www.manufacturingmanagement.co.uk