The role of a Supply Chain Director is multifaceted and critical to the success of any organization’s operations, and in this issue of Saudi Projects, we are pleased to welcome Engr. Farah K. Mahasneh, Supply Chain Director at AlMoosa Doors. Join us as we delve into his insights, strategies, and experiences, all of which help to shape the backbone of the company’s success, first asking if he could explain the main factors contributing to the company’s strength and reputation in the market.
Engr. Mahasneh: Firstly, we have young, ambitious, and educated leaders working in a structural scientific way to transform the business from the norm to a level that emulates the world-class industry-specialized companies known on a global level. Secondly, it is the company’s financial fitness, and, finally, there is the AlMoosa Doors culture, which is based on solid values and encourages continuous improvement.
Saudi Projects: Could you discuss the decision-making process behind implementing the Infor ERP system, industry-specific software for enterprise resource planning, and how it has impacted the company’s manufacturing, quoting, and scheduling processes?
Engr. Mahasneh: “The journey’s inception is defined by several pivotal events, notably the launch of Saudi Arabia Vision 2030 on April 25, 2016, the visionary outlook of AlMoosa Doors, and the active involvement of the second generation of the family. Equipped with knowledge, education, experience, exposure, and youthful zeal, they are dedicated to transforming the business into a state-of-the-art company committed to the highest industry standards.
In this context, we leverage the strategic location of the Kingdom, serving as a bridge between Africa, Asia, and Europe. This aids in realizing one of the pillars of Saudi Vision 2030: fostering innovation, driving economic growth, enhancing quality of life, and contributing to the nation’s economic diversification efforts through digital transformation.
This represents my perspective on our journey, and I am honored to be part of the team of professionals dedicated to this endeavor. I can confidently state that the most significant challenge we faced was shifting our mindset, necessitating the dismantling of internal organizational silos.
The company has invested heavily in making the ordering process of all product types, brands, and grades using the Infor CPQ more efficient
Furthermore, I am proud to announce that AlMoosa has successfully implemented the integrated, coherent engines provided by Infor, namely the Infor Configure Price Quote (CPQ) engine, the Infor Line Baan (LN) engine, and the Infor Operating Service (OS). This achievement positions us as industry leaders within the Gulf Cooperation Council and has been recognized by Infor as a remarkable success story. None of this would have been possible without the exceptional harmony, commitment, and perseverance demonstrated by our CEO and President, Mr. Yasser Almoosa, as the project sponsor; our COO and Vice President of Operations, Mr. Yousef Almoosa, as the project owner; our CFO and Vice President of Finance, Mr. Samy Salem, as the project manage.
Each project is based on individual customer specifications
Saudi Projects: Can you expand on how these challenges look on a day-to-day basis?
Engr. Mahasneh: Let’s simulate the following scenarios to understand the challenges that may happen daily with us.
- A villa owner in Riyadh who uses our product for his garage had an electricity problem that caused a failure in the opener, which he has had since he bought the villa five years ago. After all these years, the opener label was torn and he wants to repair or replace the opener but doesn’t have the required information to hand. The entire district where his home is was supplied by AlMoosa Doors and it has many types of villas that have different sizes of garage doors and different types. To put this into context, five years ago, AlMoosa Doors sold 60,000 doors across all types, with 30,000 being sold on a project basis. But thanks to the Infor ERP system, we can now track down and source replacement parts expeditiously.
- A contractor who won the contract for building a new health care facility of 250,000m2, required 4,200 doors located over 16 floors with 17 lock types. After the submittal of the initial quote, it was decided in tandem with the project owner to change the lock grade for four types to ANSI/BHMA Grade 3 instead of ANSI/BHMA Grade 1 and change another eight lock types to ANSI/BHMA Grade 2 instead of Grade 1. The client requested a revised quotation including door and hardware schedules. Because of the Infor ERP system, this can be done without delay.
Handling each case demonstrates the value of an ERP system in our day-to-day business and underlines the decision-making process behind implementing the Infor ERP system.
Saudi Projects: What improvements or efficiencies have the company experienced since implementing the Infor ERP system?
Engr. Mahasneh: Improvements include increasing the integration of information across business cycles, synchronization of the different related business processes, increasing the information visibility, enhancing the decision-making process, organizing the workflow, providing real-time data reporting, and increasing the understanding and alignment of the process performance indicator and its corresponding measurement.
We have increased the automation level of the hollow metal doors fabrication processes
Saudi Projects: How does the company ensure the consistent quality of its products?
Engr. Mahasneh: The company adopts several processes that are intended to ensure consistent product quality, including defining clear product standards, applying robust quality control processes along the material flow, continuing training and skills enhancement activities, maintaining a high level of supplier relationship, building a culture that encourages data-driven decision making, encouraging continuous improvement, monitoring customer feedback, and ensuring compliance with all applicable regulatory bodies, as well as implementing state-of-the-art technologies and automation.
Saudi Projects: Are there specific quality control measures or certifications the company adheres to?
Engr. Mahasneh: The company adheres to the requirements of ISO 9001:2015, ISO 45001:2018, Underwriters Laboratories standards (UL 10C, UL 10B, CAN/ULC S104-10), The British Standards Institution (BS 476-22), the International Conference of Building Officials standards (UBC 7-2), National Fire Protection Association standards (252-2012).
Saudi Projects: Are there standard sizes and designs with predefined prices, or is each project individually quoted based on custom specifications?
Engr. Mahasneh: Each project is tailored to specific specifications, as every structural opening varies in dimensions. While the difference in absolute value may seem insignificant in certain cases, it can lead to the door not functioning as intended according to the design of the opening. Therefore, quotations necessitate automation of pricing policies and integration of a wide array of item specifications for manufacturing, delivery, and installation of the door. All necessary data, including pricing, raw material availability, capacity, and timeline, are crucial for door delivery. To tackle this, we propose implementing a compatible ERP-integrated engine system. Consequently, we opted to adopt the Infor Configure Price Quote (CPQ) engine, the Infor Line Baan (LN) engine and the infor Operating Service (OS).
Saudi Projects: How does the complexity or customization of a door design affect the overall cost, and can you provide examples of how different features impact pricing?
Engr. Mahasneh: Complexity adds costs by requiring additional resources for the same sales order(s) volume. This industry is driven by several factors: material selection, style, design, size, configuration, vision panel, hardware, installation quality level, function, and function automation. For example, the flush single fire-rated door with a UL certificate of 90 minutes varies from the single fire-rated door with a fire-rated vision panel and fire-rated louvre with a UL certificate of 90 minutes
Saudi Projects: Can you provide a timeline for how long a quote is valid and what factors could lead to changes in the quoted price over time?
Engr. Mahasneh: Quotation validity varies based on the sales channel, seasonal time-bonded promotion period, raw material price index fluctuation, and product mix. Such cases may include cases requiring the combination of non-in-house fabricated products with fabricated item(s) procured for the concerned project only. Quotation validity is essential as it creates urgency for the client to take up the offer, gives a +1-leverage point in pricing negotiation when the quote is past the expiry date, and allows you to ensure the quote provided is up-to-date with the client’s requirements. But it also gives any supplier a platform to uplift your price.
Saudi Projects: How do changes to the project specifications after the initial quote impact pricing, and what is the process for adjusting the quote in such cases?
Engr. Mahasneh: Conceptually, project specifications should remain unchanged after the design stage, as they’ve been carefully defined considering all project conditions and details. However, no general rule can be defined to handle such a change if it occurs and quantifies its impact, whether the change affected the COGS, the lead time, or any other attribute of the quotation; managing that manually to update the quotation is a time-consuming process while having an automated process dramatically reduces the time required to adopt the changes.
The volume impacts the selling price significantly since material price fluctuations impact the COGS value
That can be labeled as one of the reasons to adopt Infor as an ERP system that streamlines all business processes, including such changes.
Saudi Projects: Are there volume discounts available for larger orders, and what criteria determine eligibility for such discounts?
Engr. Mahasneh: The volume impacts the selling price significantly since material price fluctuations impact the COGS value, and sourcing for specific projects with larger volumes increases our negotiation strength to gain better prices.
Saudi Projects: Are there any additional charges or fees that may be applied to the initial quote, such as shipping, installation, or customization fees?
Engr. Mahasneh: Yes, engineering consultation, inspection and testing, shipping, installation, or customization fees can be applied to the initial quotation, depending on the project’s scope and progress.
Saudi Projects: Can you explain your payment terms and schedule, including any upfront deposits, milestone payments, or final payments upon completion?
Engr. Mahasneh: At AlMoosa Doors we adopt best practices in defining each project’s payment term, taking into account our financial fitness, customer payment history (if applicable), industry standards, and scope within the project. This is intended to serve all customers in the best possible way without limiting the options to a specific predefined idea. It retains the correct and precise controls required to maintain a healthy cash flow and build strong customer relationships.
Saudi Projects: How does the company differentiate itself from competitors, particularly regarding product quality and strength?
Engr. Mahasneh: The company differentiates itself through six tools:
- Providing an excellent product range of options and services at a competitive price for different market segments, backed by a value-added customer experience.
- Continuous efforts to ensure the company covers all cities within the Kingdom through 45 branches over 60 cities – i.e. 75 % geographical coverage – and its ongoing effort to develop its sales through the e-commerce platforms.
- Ensuring that jeopardizing any material quality is forbidden, whether it’s raw material or material required to complete any system that includes our production items, even if such can’t affect the product’s value but may affect the company’s reputation or the system’s reliability.
- Striving to continuously implement the latest tools to receive customer feedback, concerns, and complaints, taking the necessary measures and controlling and taking corrective action.
- Continuously striving to improve our developed preventive and corrective maintenance programs to ensure the smooth operation of the product or system sold by the company.
- Constantly examining the company’s fitness and responsiveness to customer complaints to ensure an accurate, transparent, fact-based channel.
Saudi Projects: Can you share any innovations or best practices in supply chain management that the company has adopted to maintain its market position?
Engr. Mahasneh: The company adopts and strives to support the supply chain as it is essential to maintaining and enhancing its market position. To achieve this it implements the following best industry practices: recruiting and developing supply chain professionals, diversifying supplier relationships to avoid delays, developing and tracking supply chain metrics, increasing supply chain visibility, monitoring and improving the order-to-pay process, and investing in technology and software. This helps the company to build a harmonious culture and a team that shares the same values and speaks the same language.
As part of its continual efforts to diversify supplier relationships, the company attended R+T Asia 2023 in July 2023 in China, R+T Turkey 2023 in September 2023 in Turkey, Canton Fair in October 2023 in China, Big 5 Global in December 2023 in UAE, and R+T Stuttgart 2024 in February 2024 in Germany.
Saudi Projects: How does the company stay abreast of market trends and technological innovations in the automatic doors industry?
Engr. Mahasneh: The company has participated in or at least attended most of the industry-related local, national, and international exhibitions, seminars, and workshops. It has also invested in its team through different types of training, whether in-house, online, or face-to-face classroom training. Such training is not limited to technical industry-related topics either, as the company encourages employees to progress their educational levels, such as applying for a master’s degree or doctorate. The company also encourages knowledge transfer workshops to pass the acquired knowledge on to the maximum number of team members.
Saudi Projects: Can you highlight any recent innovations or adaptations the company has made to stay competitive?
Engr. Mahasneh: The company has invested heavily to make the ordering process of all product types, brands, and grades using the Infor CPQ that is integrated with Infor LN so that complex sales activities are managed more efficiently, reduce pricing, reduce product cost errors, and integrate all the functions activities within one platform that includes all of our business activities and cycles.
To strengthen its competitiveness, the company has also revamped its corporate identity, including the logo, icon, and motto, and wholly revamped brand guidelines covering all related business areas. We have a detailed plan to build a remarkable brand identity and allocate the necessary resources to ensure a smooth transition from the old identity to the new one.
Saudi Projects: What initiatives has the company undertaken recently to continuously improve its manufacturing and supply chain processes?
Engr. Mahasneh: We have increased the automation level of the hollow metal doors fabrication processes and reviewed the supply chain organizational structure to ensure the minimal level possible of conflict of interest. Furthermore, the company has created a new job to ensure consistency of process implementation to enable proper tracking and identification of potential improvement areas within the processes. We hire only candidates who can handle these newly developed roles.
Saudi Projects: How does the company foster a culture of continuous improvement among its employees?
Engr. Mahasneh: The company adopts several strategies and tools intended to foster a culture of continuous improvement among its employees, including, but not limited to, the lead by example principle, recognizing and rewarding employees, supporting cultural change activities, accepting that failure is inevitable, and viewing it as an opportunity to learn, grow, and improve. We apply a systematic approach principle by using a proven methodology to guide improvement and innovative projects.
The volume impacts the selling price significantly since material price fluctuations impact the COGS value
Saudi Projects: How does the company integrate sustainability into its supply chain and manufacturing processes?
Engr. Mahasneh: The company invests in diverse and inclusive supply chain partners and deploys technology to increase accountability and transparency. Also, we comply as much as possible with the ‘Sustainable Procurement’ principle. Selecting suppliers that adhere to ethical, social, and environmental standards is a factor of the evaluation criteria. The company monitors and analyzes the environmental impact of its supply chain practices, which allows better decision-making, identification of improvement opportunities, and mitigation of risks.
Al Moosa Doors
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