Customer Success Story: Syngenta

Apolix helps leading global agriculture company, Syngenta, achieve transparency with their processes, helping prevent over 4,000 production stops in just 10 months, unlock millions in working capital, and save 30,000 hours of rework.

Syngenta, a leading science-based agtech company with headquarters in Switzerland, has 30,000 employees in more than 90 countries working to transform how crops are grown and protected. They work to help millions of farmers around the world grow safe and nutritious food, while taking care of the planet.

Today, farmers must overcome a range of obstacles in order to run their business. They must adapt to the effects of climate change, improve soil, enhance biodiversity, and respond to society’s views on food and agricultural technology. In an effort to combat this, Syngenta invests in more sustainable agriculture which is good for farmers, nature, and society.

Syngenta’s impressive journey is a testament to the company’s vision and direction. But like every business, their growth and expansion didn’t come without complexity.

Compliance requirements

Ensuring safety and compliance requirements are met is a top priority in any sector, but especially so for companies in the chemical industry. To maintain product traceability and meet legal requirements, Syngenta’s master data must be faultless.

Previously, production runs were halted due to unsynchronised materials, duplicated information, or an unfilled SAP field. With data dispersed across various systems and Excel sheets, the Master Data Management (MDM) team realised the need for greater efficiency in identifying the root causes of data issues.

Finding hidden value

Considering that a production stop could take anywhere from a few hours to a couple of days, the significant impact on logistics and working capital is easy to comprehend.

Knowing the data cleansing process – from identifying a problem to correction – is a timely process, Apolix introduced the MDM team to process mining. Using Celonis, Apolix showed the team how to connect teams, systems, and processes for the first time.

By connecting data from all IT systems, Syngenta are able to understand where the hidden value is and how to capture it.

By introducing Syngenta to the endless capabilities of Celonis’ intelligent automation, the MDM team can now:

• Respond quickly to prevent production stops.
• Receive automated alerts about inaccurate or incomplete master data fields.
• Understand any data issues e.g. if any materials are missing a serialisation number, how many orders they’re assigned to, and the scheduled production run time

In just 10 months, the MDM team prevented over 4,000 production stops. This huge accomplishment helped Syngenta unlock millions in working capital and save approximately 30,000 hours of rework. 

Looking to the future

Syngenta’s collaboration with Apolix and Celonis has allowed them to utilise process mining to find untapped potential and see how their processes really run.

Today, perhaps most importantly, employees are now equipped with data-driven insights, enabling them to better prioritise their time and make informed decisions. Working together towards continuous improvement has reinforced a strong culture of innovation. We look forward to future collaborations.

Read more about the collaboration here.