Aviation Technical Services: Enhancing Project-Level Cost Insight with Analytics
Technology Category
- Functional Applications - Computerized Maintenance Management Systems (CMMS)
- Platform as a Service (PaaS) - Application Development Platforms
Applicable Industries
- Aerospace
- Finance & Insurance
Applicable Functions
- Maintenance
- Product Research & Development
Use Cases
- Demand Planning & Forecasting
- Inventory Management
About The Customer
Aviation Technical Services (ATS) has been providing maintenance, repair, and overhaul services for commercial and military aircraft for over 45 years. Today, it employs over 1,500 employees and supports a global customer base across three business platforms: Airframe Services, Components Services, and Engineering Services. As one of the world’s leading aircraft maintenance, repair, and overhaul (MRO) providers, ATS operates in a highly competitive industry where clients demand the best service at the lowest price. The company's success is linked to the fortunes of its clients in the airline industry, which operates on notoriously tight profit margins.
The Challenge
Aviation Technical Services (ATS), a leading provider of maintenance, repair, and overhaul services for commercial and military aircraft, faced a significant challenge in managing labor costs and maintaining profitability. The company operates in a highly competitive industry where clients demand the best service at the lowest price. The challenge for ATS was to balance the need for highly skilled labor, which comes at a high cost, with the need to keep labor costs as low as possible. The company was also struggling with a complex, manual, spreadsheet-based forecasting process that was holding back its finance team. The challenge was to find a more efficient way to allocate resources, manage aircraft maintenance projects more cost-effectively, and gain deeper insight into labor costs.
The Solution
ATS decided to replace its complex spreadsheet-based forecasting process with a centralized financial analytics solution. The company partnered with Applied Analytix to design and develop a sophisticated financial model that accurately allocates costs and revenues to each project. The solution, IBM® Cognos® TM1®, automatically feeds data from the company’s source systems, performs all necessary calculations, builds a financial forecast, and creates a full income statement. This provides an accurate, detailed, and timely view of profit and loss at the project level across the whole business. The solution also allows ATS to quickly develop different reporting packs for various stakeholders and generate them automatically each month. The IBM solution gives ATS much greater insight into the profitability of each of its projects, enabling more informed decision-making.
Operational Impact
Quantitative Benefit
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