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Summer 1999
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General Automation, Inc. has announced that Relco Corporation (Reliable Automotive), the USA’s largest speciality automotive accessories distributor, has completed its implementation of General Automation’s mv.ENTERPRISE database management system on a Groupe BULL Rack computer. Relco selected General Automation’s AIX-based solution to replace a proprietary Sequoia system, enabling the company to streamline large, multiple databases, facilitate a boost in sales and order entry processes and provide an IT architecture for future growth. “We are committed to helping our customers adopt new technology and providing greater accessibility to leading edge solutions,” said Jane M. Christie, General Automation president and chief executive officer. “Relco’s selection of our open, high-end environment, mv.ENTERPRISE, enhances its competitive edge by opening the door to a variety of industry-standard tools and best-of-breed solutions, including ODBC, Web integration and data warehousing.” As a major wholesale and retail supplier of speciality automotive products, Relco Corporation, based in Overland Park, Kansas, has an ambitious growth plan that had been hindered by a nine-year old outdated IT system. With the priority of maintaining its competitive advantage and integrating leading-edge technologies, Relco migrated to General Automation’s AIX-based mv.ENTERPRISE environment on a Bull Escala Rack computer and a Tower computer platform. The 568-user mv.ENTERPRISE system supports Relco’s 300 employees and its complete business operation including sales, distribution, customer service and financial applications. Relco distributes products on the wholesale end through Reliable Automotive, supplying specialty accessories to Western Auto, Advance Auto, Pep Boys, NAPA, Carquest and jobbers throughout the United States. In addition, Relco direct markets products through Sears’ Shop-at-Home, Bass Pro Truck World and Wholesale Advantage, shipping automotive parts to 95 per cent of the continental U.S. through 11 nationwide distribution centres. “Operating on the old system was increasingly slow and we needed a platform which was flexible in its own right and compatible with future IT requirements,” said Dan DeSive, Relco’s manager of information technologies. “The combination of the Escala hardware and the mv.ENTERPRISE database has given us the horsepower we needed to increase productivity and the open platform we needed to be able to integrate the latest third party software.” According to DeSive, the mv.ENTERPRISE solution has opened the door to new technologies and middleware solutions that had been unfeasible on the previous system. “Now that we have an open software environment, we can incorporate strategic third party applications that will take our company to the next level,” he explained. “General Automation has been very supportive in our efforts to evaluate leading-edge solutions such as Liberty ODBC, RedBack Web integration, EDI, data business intelligence and data warehouse tools.” After a review of competitive databases and warehouse management systems, Relco chose mv.ENTERPRISE because of performance, ease-of-use and time to spare. “We felt General Automation’s product offered the best overall solution to our needs,” DeSive said. “We were sacrificing productivity, efficiencies and data availability on the old machine and needed to get to a high-performing, open environment very quickly. mv.ENTERPRISE was the only system with a simple conversion process that also provided the increase in performance our company demanded.” Relco, which publishes and mails millions of catalogs per year, generates up to 300,000 sales calls per month. DeSive noted that the conversion to mv.ENTERPRISE on a Bull computer has greatly improved the company’s sales efficiencies, because the system is operating at a speed where the operators can deal with more customers in shorter amounts of time. Its customer service and distribution departments have seen immediate benefits through the speedy access to information, the ability to work more efficiently and to better serve its customers, he said. “GA’s technology made it possible for Relco to execute a major reengineering in a short period of time with minimal outside assistance,” said William Rice, general manager of General Automation’s System Solutions Business Unit. “GA is committed to providing companies with solutions that are cost-effective and easy to implement, while carefully managing rapid corporate growth.” “The level of support from General Automation’s sales and systems staff has been excellent,” DeSive concluded. “They established a partnership with us right from the start, introduced us to third-party products, and orchestrated cooperation from GA suppliers as we needed them to stay on track with our conversion schedule. We have a great deal of faith in the stability of General Automation’s products and the quality of its technology. We expect that General Automation will help us evolve and strengthen our IT processes well into the next century.”
GA Mentor LimitedLast Updated: 30 June 1999