Cheesemaker finds Linux hard to beat

By ADAM GIFFORD

Kapiti Cheese has chosen to run its new enterprise software system, MFG Pro from QAD, on the open source Red Hat Linux operating system.

Financial controller Alan Bird said the operating system decision came down to cost, reliability and familiarity.

QAD's Australia and New Zealand managing director, Gordon Fleming, said about 40 of the 5400 MFG Pro sites worldwide were on Linux.

"We have found it to be robust technically, certainly not less so than NT," said Fleming. "We just don't get support calls regarding that platform.

"Between 30 and 40 per cent of our sales are currently on NT, and it is likely Linux will make a dent in that."

Kapiti Cheese, an unlisted public company, has about 150 staff and a turnover this year of just under $20 million for sales of cheese and icecream.

Bird said it had been running a CBA financial system and doing most of its planning and scheduling using Excel spreadsheets and Access databases.

"As the business has grown, we realised we needed better tools to manage it," he said.



Bird said the system would allow Kapiti to give its suppliers information months ahead about what their demand was likely to be, allowing them to tailor their production to suit.

It would also provide a platform for more efficient ways of dealing with customers, such as producing electronic invoices.

Fleming said a large chunk of QAD's sales in Australasia were in the food and beverage sector. Other clients included Goodman Fielder, Tip Top, Comvita and Enza's fruit juice business.

He said QAD had ended its agency relationship with systems integrator Cogita and was now attempting to build up a direct sales and implementation team in New Zealand. Until that happened implementations were being managed out of Australia, where it had 120 staff.

"We prefer to go direct," Fleming said. "We have found if the market is slow, partner organisations tend to encourage customisation or bolting little bits of functionality into the application environment."