Background

Our client is a pharmaceutical business unit of Akzo Nobel NV, a multinational company based in the Netherlands. Today, our client has nearly 10,000 employees and is active in more than 100 countries.

Business Challenge

Our client's West Orange, NJ, facility faced a growing challenge of managing their Standard Operating Procedure (SOP) documents. With the volume of documents increasing at 20% per year, their paper-based approach was very labor-intensive, expensive and error prone.

Objectives

Create an electronic document management system that will accomplish the following:

• Decrease review and approval times
• Reduce copying and shipping costs
• Provide better reporting capabilities.

Technical Solutions

Sitrof Technologies, Inc. used Documentum 4i server with customized Desktop Client (DTC) front-end.

Application

Customized DTC components such as Check-In, Properties, and Task Manager. New DTC components such as Reassign Tasks, Pull Reviewer Tasks, and Submit Change Request.

Tools

Visual Basic for customized DTC components. Active Server Pages and XML for web based workflow reports.

Results

• Documents are now reviewed and approved 50% faster.
• Thousands of dollars a year have been saved in photocopy and shipping charges.
• Web-based workflow status reports eliminate the need to track down who is currently working on a document and gives the Document Administrator the control to improve productivity.
• Electronic sticky notes make it easier for document authors to read reviewer comments.
• Electronic backups reduce the amount of storage space needed SOPs available to all users via the company Intranet.

Closing Statement

Sitrof built a custom electronic SOP system that has greatly reduced the amount of time spent reviewing and approving documents. This has allowed our client to re-deploy resources that were previously dedicated to make photocopies and collecting hand signatures.