Automotive Leaders Roll Out i2 Solutions; Cooper Tire & Rubber Company Goes Live With Multiple i2 Solutions
DALLAS--May 8, 2002--i2 Technologies, Inc., the leading provider of value chain management solutions, today announced Cooper Tire & Rubber Company, which specializes in the manufacture and marketing of automotive products for consumers, has successfully gone live with i2 Supply Chain Strategist. Cooper Tire also has implemented i2's Transportation solution.
i2 continues to be the automotive industry's provider of choice, with seven of the world's top 10 automakers turning to i2 for value chain management solutions. Projects recently implemented at automakers including Toyota, Hyundai and Yazaki North America, Inc., encompass more than 30 manufacturing facilities, 1,500 dealers and more than 1,000 automotive suppliers.
Cooper Tire & Rubber Company Optimizes Systems with i2 Solutions
With an aggressive acquisition growth strategy and its customers moving toward smaller order quantities and increasing order frequency, Cooper Tire sought to optimize its transportation and logistics systems through a value chain management initiative. After thoroughly evaluating a number of solutions on the market, Cooper Tire selected and implemented i2 Supply Chain Strategist. With i2 Supply Chain Strategist, Cooper Tire is able to optimize its network of physical plant locations, processes and transportation lanes, ensuring the most effective and profitable use of resources while assuring the highest levels of customer service.
"Using i2 Supply Chain Strategist, we are able to do a variety of 'what-if' scenarios and quickly identified several redundant facilities where we could consolidate services," said George McAfee, project manager, Operations Research - Supply Chain Operations, at Cooper Tire & Rubber Company. "That strategy was executed to the letter."
"Our engagement with Cooper Tire continues our heritage of market share leadership in automotive," said Tom Meredith, i2 group vice president, Automotive Industry, Americas. "The viability, scalability and strength of our value chain management solutions are proven in auto companies around the world. We are committed to helping manufacturers succeed through the delivery of solutions that meet the unique challenges of the automotive value chain."
Cooper Tire also put into operation i2's Transportation solution, part of i2 Supply Chain Management (SCM). The solution manages the inbound movement of goods from the plants to the distribution centers and outbound from the distribution center to customers. By implementing the i2 solution, Cooper Tire saw a significant reduction in transportation and logistics costs that contributed to its bottom line, while enhancing the velocity of its customer order fulfillment.
"We believe customer service is a competitive differentiator, and transportation closes the loop on customer service," said McAfee. "It's all about making better decisions to deliver more value to our customers while controlling operating costs. We've got more shipments of varied sizes going out than ever before and we quickly realized this added complexity couldn't be managed with legacy technologies and methods. So we turned to i2. It was a business necessity."
Cooper Tire is already achieving significant results from its implementation. The company has added velocity and efficiency to its decision making process and gained additional visibility to the impact of transportation costs on profitability. Moving from manual transportation planning and execution processes to an automated system powered by i2, allowed Cooper Tire to make faster, more accurate business decisions. "The implementation was ahead of schedule and under budget," concluded McAfee. "And the value continues to exceed expectations."
More i2 Solutions Implemented at Toyota, Hyundai
Toyota Motor Sales accessories and replacement parts business implemented the i2 Service Management solution within its Monarch project. The i2 solution manages inventory and promises accurate delivery dates for all Toyota Genuine Parts, providing total inventory support for 1,500 North American Toyota and Lexus dealers, as well as its 450 suppliers. The system provides accurate due-date quoting, so orders can be filled against inventory at the lowest carrying and transportation cost.
Hyundai Motor Corporation deployed i2's Collaborative Supply Management solution to manage and reduce inventory throughout its extended supply chain. The i2 solution is designed to provide Hyundai and its suppliers with demand visibility, so they can plan appropriate responses, reduce lead times and better respond to changing market conditions. Hyundai and its suppliers can now collaborate in real-time to match inventory supply with customer demand.
Automotive Industry Leaders to Speak at i2 PLANET
The automotive industry takes on a high profile at this year's i2 PLANET, May 13 - 16, in Las Vegas. A dozen of the industry's leading executives will describe their successes in value chain management, conveying best practices and illustrating the benefits derived. DaimlerChrysler's Karenann Terrell is a general session speaker. Other speakers from the automotive industry include representatives of Cooper Tire, Ford, Delphi, Hyundai Motors and Michelin North America. To register to attend, please visit www.i2.com.
About i2
i2 is the leading provider of value chain management solutions that offer businesses maximum return on investment in the shortest amount of time. i2's value chain management solutions help companies plan and execute all of the activities involved in managing supply and demand, while requiring minimum change in current business processes. These solutions span the entire scope of value chain interactions, including demand chain management, supply chain management and supplier relationship management. Established in 1988, i2 is the only software solutions provider that measures, audits and reports total value provided to its customers, with a mission to deliver $75 billion in value by 2005. Learn more at www.i2.com. i2 is a registered trademark of i2 Technologies, Inc. and its subsidiaries.
i2 Cautionary Language
This press release may contain forward-looking statements that involve risks and uncertainties including forward-looking statements regarding the customer's ability to implement or integrate i2 solutions successfully and in a timely fashion, receive expected functionality and performance, or achieve benefits attributable to i2 solutions. These forward-looking statements involve risks and uncertainties that may cause actual results to differ from those projected. For a discussion of factors, which could impact i2's financial results and cause actual results to differ materially from those in forward-looking statements, please refer to i2's recent filings with the SEC, particularly the Form 10-K filed April 1, 2002 and Form 10-Q filed April 29, 2002. i2 assumes no obligation to update the forward-looking information contained in this news release.