The automotive industry has taken a particularly hard hit the past few years as it continues to try to adapt to a changing marketplace. But one local company has introduced a technology to ease a little of this sector’s troubles.
OEConnection LLC in Richfield is a provider of Web-based technology solutions for automakers, their affiliated dealers and others in the automotive parts business. More specifically, OEConnection provides e-commerce parts procurement and analysis tools that enable users to better market, manage and move their original equipment parts inventory.
Or as Ted Fellowes, vice president of supply chain solutions, likes to put it, “Right part. Right place. Right time.”
The company’s D2D Link Web-based supply chain technology connects nearly 12,000 automotive dealerships and eight domestic and import Original Equipment Manufacturers, including DaimlerChrysler, General Motors, Ford Motor Co. and Toyota.
The technology allows dealers to locate a part at the nearest participating OEConnection subscriber instead of wasting time and money calling random dealerships all over town or waiting for a part on national backorder.
It works like an online parts exchange or parts sourcing portal. A service technician can simply look on the network to locate the nearest part, greatly reducing dealers’ fill rates — the percentage of times a part can be made immediately available or made available as quickly as possible to service a vehicle.
For example, oftentimes when a vehicle is taken in for regular service or maintenance, another repair or problem is detected, which may require a part that the service department does not have in stock. The technician could use the parts locator to find a dealership in the area that has that part, enabling the dealer to meet its original commitment to have the car back by 5 p.m. that day.
“I think that the most significant benefit is improved customer satisfaction,” says Fellowes. “And that’s a benefit that (points) to not only the dealer but the automaker.
“The automakers are now able to view the billions of dollars of parts out there as part of their virtual warehouse. They are no longer limited by what they have at the factory or a specific warehouse. They now have thousands of virtual warehouses.”
HOW TO REACH: OEConnection, www.oeconnection.com
