Founded in 1986 by Thompson T.H Chang, Anchor Fasteners enabled digital transformation to produce excellent quality fasteners and reduce downtime. They leveraged the benefits of Dynamics 365 ERP for Manufacturing and Microsoft Azure IoT, and other data services to boost their OEE (Overall Equipment Effectiveness) by 15%, the machine utilization rate by 12%, and cut downtime by about 17%. It immensely aided them with improved production efficiency and yielded more orders.
Fasteners are sometimes unnoticeable. However, they still manage to hold an aircraft together. Anchor Fasteners manufactures a wide range of high-quality fasteners and broadens product lines for the bio-medical and auto sector with time.
The company is based in the Ganeshan district, at the central location where Taiwan’s fasteners are primarily manufactured (about 70%). With their unique capability to forge cold, they have boosted 30% of the product’s agility and provided outstanding products to their customers.
Chang’s vision has come to life which is reflected in the company’s sales. Today, Anchor Fasteners’ main revenue comes from foreign exports and supplies the most expansion of river nuts and bolts in Asia and Taiwan.
The Moment Where Anchor Fasteners Witnessed the Industry Transition and Desperately Needed ERP for Manufacturing
Taiwan counts exporting fasteners as the primary economic driver and is highly driven by foreign exchange rates and overall market conditions. With increasing competition and rapid global changes.
Chang found lucrative economic opportunities in the auto segment and turned to it in the year 2000. Auto fasteners occupy half of their production. Anchor also invested in optical inspection technology to increase yield.
Another major shift in this business was to set foot in the Vietnamese market. Since 2004, Anchor has been producing fasteners for scooters. Investing in magnesium alloy products also allowed them to enter the bike industry and capitalize on their light metal needs.
Chang has seen challenges and opportunities throughout this time and was resolute to bring the whole industry forward. After facing the growing competitive threats from China and Vietnam, Chan focused on strengthening their technology to get a competitive edge in the industry. They started researching and preferred to choose ERP for Manufacturing. After considering various factors, Microsoft Dynamics 365 was the most viable choice.
COVID-19 Accelerated the Business Transformation of Taiwan’s Fasteners Industry
COVID pandemic hit the fastener industry hard in Taiwan. In 2020, Anchor Fasteners had to encounter a series of hurdles such as last-minute orders, currency appreciation, an increase in the price of raw material, logistics and workforce shortages, and so on. The business then decided to upgrade its business model with ERP for Manufacturing and considered selling 92% of its produce abroad. Eventually, this transformation became more of a necessity than a choice.
The general manager of Anchor Fasteners Pi-Feng Chu describes Chang’s involvement with the company as a series of marketing and product strategy shifts and using digital transformation for an internal upgrade.
Azure Cloud Transformed Their Journey of Productivity
Azure Cloud transformed how they operate their business. With so many uncertainties around, they still managed to take a data-centric approach. Personalized their solutions and most importantly gained complete visibility across their end-to-end supply chain. They further blended productivity apps with intelligent manufacturing cloud services and security to upgrade their work and optimize their workforce. With handy technology like this, they could easily fill labor gaps.
Moreover, they even managed to make stronger relationships with their customers than their competition in the market with the help of Azure Cloud. They also analyzed upcoming threats and customized technology to become futureproof using IT, OT, and open scalable and trustworthy ideas.
Their service resilience and profitability with intelligent supply chain planning and execution witnessed an improvement. Further, they could create new business values and sustainable practices with connected products even during times of uncertainty.
Just like Anchor Fasteners, many other manufacturing businesses have benefited from Dynamics 365 ERP for Manufacturing and Cloud Azure Services. If you want to experience exceptional services that streamline your business and boost your profit threefold, you can Contact Trident Information Systems. We are a Gold Dynamics 365 Implementation Partner and Diamond LS Retail Implementation Partner.
