Aegion has been a leader in the pipe maintenance industry for more than 45 years. What started as a business focused on sewer rehabilitation has expanded significantly in the last 10 years with the acquisition of oil and gas businesses. Now, it has complex business processes in the warehouse and in the field across many locations.
Aegion’s use of manual, paper-based processes posed a challenge to achieving optimal efficiency. Aegion has about 400 different crews in the field on a daily basis, and they all create field tickets by hand. The nature of these paper-based processes meant there were often delays in getting information captured and into customers’ hands, which impacted Aegion’s customer service levels.
It was important for Aegion to have a better understanding of what was happening each day in the field. A lot of data was being gathered, but because it was all on paper and being stored in cabinets, information couldn’t be accessed quickly. The company needed to be able to share information with more people in a timelier way.
After searching for a way to eliminate paper-based processes and mobilize its organization, Aegion selected Cloud Inventory. With Cloud Inventory, Aegion was able to develop and deploy applications that solved specific business challenges while integrating them into the company’s ERP system. Plus, having a single platform with few additional IT needs reduced the total cost of ownership (TCO) for Aegion.
“When it comes to the type of information that we capture in the field itself, there was nothing out of the box available to address those needs,” said Thys Lourens, Chief Information Officer for Aegion. “That’s where the custom development piece on the Cloud Inventory side helped us tremendously.”
Cloud Inventory has given Aegion the ability to streamline its processes across its business in both the U.S. and Canada.
By moving to digital applications, Aegion has significantly decreased the time it takes to complete invoices; what used to take weeks now takes only a day.
The company also has a projected 200% reduction in the time it takes for daily field tickets to be created.
Aegion’s IT team is self-sufficient as it can now develop custom applications and turn them around quickly. The team is currently developing a safety application that will be put in the hands of every employee to capture safety observations. It will be able to analyze information about safety in the field and, based on those findings, create training materials and programs to address the most common safety issues.
In addition to streamlining daily tasks for its team, Aegion has significantly improved service levels for its customers. With data at their fingertips, users can report and bill work as it is completed in a timely way. Now, customers have begun to suggest mobile applications that Aegion can develop to improve process efficiencies within their own four walls.
Tim Bremer, Director of IT Applications at Aegion, said that for the Cloud Inventory solution to work with the organization, it came down to a few key questions: “Is the tool user friendly? Is the solution practical? It’s been that type of tool.”
Customer Support