Getting an edge on the competition
IFS Applications will make Rampart Global one of the only contract engineering firms in the country equipped with advanced product lifecycle management (PLM), supply chain management (SCM), customer relationship management (CRM), and enterprise resource planning (ERP) capabilities. Rampart Global is positioning itself to become a leader in the emerging Project Economy, the natural successor of the Industrial and Information Ages. Rampart Global will be taking on roles typically filled by in-house departments at their aerospace and defense (A&D) and commercial manufacturing customers. In the new Project Economy, the ability to bring high-quality products to market more rapidly is driving many companies to engage contract engineering firms such as Rampart Global to handle entire engineering processes, just as they did with manufacturing processes in years past. “We recognize that our information-based economy is maturing and moving increasingly towards a Project Economy,” Dunn said. “Those of us who grew up in the industrial economy ultimately witnessed the revolutionary changes in our companies resulting from advancements in communication and information technologies. The better companies are taking themselves to the next level by refining their communication processes and taking better advantage of available communication technology.” According to Dunn, product development companies, in particular, are applying the principles of continuous process improvement while examining their respective supply chains to determine how value is being added at each process step. Their ultimate objective is to identify core competencies, concentrate and improve on those, and outsource the rest with the goal of maximizing the value delivered by the entire supply chain. “We are seeing increasingly our customer companies developing a sensitivity in terms of value and recognizing that it is no longer one company competing against another—it is entire supply chains competing against other supply chains,” Dunn said. Shortening product lifecycles
Initially, Rampart Global’s focus will be on servicing the engineering needs of the A&D industry, but in time more and more commercial accounts will be added to the customer portfolio, according to Dunn. The company’s leadership team, including Dunn, has significant experience in the A&D arena, and the nature of how government projects come to market will drive demand for Rampart Global’s services. “Both the A&D and commercial sectors are approaching this supply chain refinement and improvement process in similar ways, but with different points of emphasis,” Dunn said. “When you look at A&D, what you typically observe are large, complicated development programs that emerge after a lengthy decision process. To get these programs off to a good start and achieve developmental deadlines, engineers with the right skill mix must be identified, recruited, and put to work almost overnight.” Dunn said that the challenge faced by large A&D companies is simple: how to get the right talent quickly. Rampart Global’s goal is to offer scalable solutions to customers like these in a near real-time fashion by simplifying and streamlining their supply chains and eliminating the resource management burden. “Our IFS partners are helping us link existing engineering resources located throughout the country with our own internal engineering capacity, enabling us to perform engineering in a truly collaborative way,” Dunn said. “Avoiding the human resourcing challenge has value to most of our customers, but the real value is in getting products to market sooner.” Communication challenges
Outsourcing always introduces communication challenges, which create cost and schedule risks that must be managed, especially if nontraditional, nontransactional functions such as engineering, PLM, and program management are included. Information must flow freely, yet in a disciplined fashion, between Rampart Global and its customers and subcontractors. The advanced service-oriented architecture (SOA) of IFS Applications will help Dunn and his team overcome these challenges. Each functional module of IFS Applications consists of thousands of individual software components, each with its own Internet protocol (IP) address. This will enable tight integration of Rampart Global’s systems with those of other companies and the creation of flexible web portals for its customers and suppliers. “We need to deal not only with the normal business processes, such as issuing purchase orders and getting invoices paid, but also with the collaborative engineering challenges inherent in an extended, virtual organization,” Dunn said. “Our customers and suppliers are on both coasts and scattered everywhere in between, and our base of operations is in Chicago. “We need the enabling capabilities for software tools, that is, what has driven us to IFS. What is going to allow for the greatest opportunity for success is the web-based collaborative portals that will allow us to really deal with our supply chain issues and to manage all of that all the way into our customers’ arena.” SOA-enabled
According to IFS North America CFO Mitch Dwight, Rampart Global is on the leading edge of a sea change in the way business will be done in the future. “A number of years ago, our research and development department realized that distributed, open systems would be more important to our customers in the future,” Dwight said. “Our progression two versions ago to an SOA-based platform has allowed us to offer today rich functionality flexible enough to handle the growing disconnection between the marketing of a product and where and how it is produced. Dwight said this disconnection is leading to extended supply chains, which in the face of shortening product lifecycles create communication and technology challenges. “Add to this the complexity of the international reach of almost every business today, along with the resulting regulatory burdens, and it becomes clear that a 20th century business application is not robust enough for a 21st century business such as Rampart Global,” Dwight said. “In today’s Project Economy, managing or participating in an extended supply chain requires that companies leverage communications and management technology designed for the new environment.” Earned value management
In the A&D industry, suppliers to most government entities are required to quantify performance over the course of a contract engagement using earned value management (EVM) techniques. According to Dunn, applying these techniques and quantifying value in terms of cost and schedule performance are becoming more and more important in both the public and the commercial sectors. “The economy is becoming more project-oriented, and the expectations for strong project management skills are increasing,” Dunn said. “Companies must possess the processes and tools to manage in ways that demonstrate required capabilities to really optimize supply chain performance. EVM is part of that equation, and IFS has many EVM processes and techniques that are fully integrated into their product.” Facts about Rampart Global, Inc.
Rampart Global is a lean engineering resource management company, providing engineering solutions to aerospace, defense, and commercial customers throughout the United States. It responds to the outsourcing needs of industry by providing experienced engineering talent on a managed- and variable-cost basis. The Rampart team consists of Rampart engineers supplemented by resources obtained from a nationwide network of engineering service providers. Rampart’s broad-based team provides a full spectrum of engineering solutions for customers demanding scalable and flexible results on short notice. Rampart is a network- and process-centric business and is focusing its investment in people, management information systems, and processes to achieve best-inclass status as an engineering services provider. Benefits
- Improved project management
- Better collaboration between employees, customers, and subcontractors
- Support for earned value management (EVM)
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