In 2003, Santa Clara, Calif.-based Sun Microsystems determined that its "first-generation" service parts planning solution had outlived its usefulness and was not capable of meeting the needs of the company's global service parts network. Sun's senior director for supply chain management, Steve Simpson, and his team determined that they needed a single, easy-to-use, highly scalable management system capable of supporting the complexities of the company's rapidly growing, global service parts network. Specific requirements included a solution that could:

• Meet its existing service level agreements (SLAs)

• Help align the global service organization and operate on a single, global instance system and leverage global economies of scale

• Reduce service parts obsolescence

• Reduce orphaned part revisions through true complex parts chaining

• Ensure profitable service contracts through installed base and service contract planning, and

• Run on Sun technology.

Sun Microsystems selected Servigistics Planning solution, version 7.7, to address its global service parts management challenges. The implementation included integration with Oracle and multiple transaction systems. Sun completed implementation of the Servigistics solution in less than 25 weeks with a total project budget of under $6m.

By replacing our "first-generation" service part solutions with Servigistics, Simpson says, Sun has already experienced a return on investment of five times the original investment, with what the company calls "return on Sun sigma" (ROSS). Three months following the global implementation, Sun measured $30m ROSS and achieved ROSS of more than $40m after 12 months. Sun continues to track and measure ROSS for this project and expects it to reach $100m in year three of the project.

"Consistently delivering high-quality performance results, Servigistics' solution enabled Sun to improve the company's already high standards of service excellence and streamline our global service parts network for optimal operating performance," says Simpson.

In fact, in recognition of the value that the Servigistics solution delivered, Sun awarded Servigistics a Meritorious Supplier Award, which honors achievements in the areas of supplier cost effectiveness, quality, availability and technology.

"Servigistics clearly does what it sets out to do: deliver beyond expectations," says Simpson. "That commitment comes from all levels of the organization."