In operating a business network that covers almost all regions of Indonesia with various market segments, PT INTI CITRA AGUNG, renowned for its Optik Melawai brand, requires integrated, real-time, and sophisticated system support. SAP S/4HANA offers reliable solution in dealing with future business challenges.

OPTIK MELAWAI is a well-known brand in Indonesia optical market. So, it is naturally to say that Optik Melawai is the market leader in the Indonesia optical industry. Although relatively young compared to the competitors in the industry, Optik Melawai is able to lead in terms of the number of stores in its network, both offline and online.

Optik Melawai was established in 1981. Starting from an outlet on Jalan Melawai, Blok M, South Jakarta, now Optik Melawai chain has spread its branches throughout Indonesia. Up to now, Optik Melawai operates approximately 320 branches. The presence of Optik Melawai in 1981 also became a special milestone for the journey of the Indonesian optical industry. Many breakthroughs and innovations have been made by Optik Melawai such as open store concept or outlet without doors. With this concept, Optik Melawai closes the gap between society and optics. This innovation was later followed by many competitors.

Apart from that, Optik Melawai is also known as an optical industry player that provides service for all market segments. Optik Melawai does not only target customers based on age level but also to customer buying power. This, as stated by Wellie Boenawan, IT Head of PT Inti Citra Agung, started from the vision which later becomes the motto of Optik Melawai, “When you expect the very best”, Optik Melawai provide all customers with the best services, best quality products and integrated lens laboratory which can be considered as the most sophisticated lens laboratory so far.

Digital Transformation

The innovative breakthrough that has been becoming the spirit of Optik Melawai also did not stop when the Covid-19 pandemic broke out.

During Covid-19 pandemic, Optik Melawai as well as all other enterprises were required to be more inovative. There was no other choice, businesses must adapt quickly. In the case of Optik Melawai, digital transformation has indeed become one of the priorities in Optik Melawai's road map.

Optik Melawai has been operating its online store through optikmelawai.com to support its business. During pandemic, the online channel has proved very helpful for Optik Melawai customers who want to buy without leaving their house.

In order to cater these customers’ needs better, Optik Melawai then launched the Online to home service. Through this feature, customers who need services from Optik Melawai can contact Optik Melawai. Optik Melawai team which is equipped with test equipment and frame samples will visit consumers' homes swiftly (quickly and responsively). Customers responses toward this service during the pandemic was quite high. Later on, with the decline of Covid-19 cases and less restriction people activities, customers start visiting Optik Melawai outlets in various branches.

Moreover, in order to optimize business process in the organization, Optik Melawai management has decided to make an improvement and a breakthrough in its digital systems to further streamline its business and management processes.

SAP S4/HANA, Integrating the parts

Wellie Boenawan said that in running its business, Optik Melawai is supported by a number of systems developed by Optik Melawai themselves. To record sales, for example, Optik Melawai relies on the Point of Sales System (POS) which was developed in accordance with Optik Melawai's business culture and style. This system itself has been used since the 1990s and is still be used until today, with various adjustments.

“Our POS is different from other retail outlets. Unlike other retailers, we have a different pattern of business. For example, we deal with the eye prescriptions and many other unique detail information. That's why the ready-to-use POS cannot cater our needs. We have to develop it ourselves," says Wellie Boenawan.

This POS is used by all Optik Melawai branches anywhere. However, the POS is indeed considered not completely perfect. Especially regarding to the connection with Electronic Data Capture (EDC) machine. The POS system cannot directly connect to the EDC machine used in transaction patterns at Optik Melawai outlets. This situation caused its own problems. Wellie Boenawan said that entry errors often occurred, such as customers transaction using Bank A cards, but the data was inputted as Bank B’s transaction instead. Such an error has led to complexity in the accounting department, which must validate all incoming financial data.

That is just for sales application. In other departments, Optik Melawai is also supported by various applications that are specially designed to meet the needs of each division or department, such as Warehouse, Inventory, Merchandising, and others.

"All existing applications have succeeded in fully supporting the needs of each department, but all of these applications are not well integrated with the Finance & Accounting system," said Wellie Boenawan.

Again, that left the intricacy to Optik Melawai management that has to deal with from time to time. Let’s say about the HPP (cost of goods sold) data, for example. Before the system was integrated, it was difficult to know the real HPP by item. It could be known only as global condition. In the past, to find out total inventory status in a certain period, we have to collect stock quantity, purchases quantity, and sales quantity. Based on that data, the condition of an item could be identified.

Another difficulty came from the financial report side. It was difficult to generate the monthly financial report.

In order to overcome these obstacles, Optik Melawai management has decided to implement SAP S4/HANA as an integrated application system which has been implemented now in Optik Melawai. Besides the above reasons, according to Wellie Boenawan, the management also considered that it is the right time to accelerate the existing business process of Optik Melawai. “In terms of age, the previous system can be considered to be quite old. In the meantime, the number of branches keep on growing, and the transactions get bigger. Therefore, the management decided to use SAP as the core system,” said Wellie Boenawan.

There are severeal SAP modules that are used by Optik Melawai. Among them are Finance and Control (FICO) for financial accountancy, Material Management (MM) for purchase management and inventory movement, Sales and Distribution (SD) for sales, and Project System (PS) for project management. Currently Optik Melawai is also implementing Warehouse Management System (WMS) to support the plan in developing a new warehouse that will be utilized as Distribution Center.

What happen to the existing POS? Wellie Boenawan said, until now Optik Melawai is still using the existing POS because the new POS is in the development process which takes quite a long time. The next step is to integrate the current POS system with the SAP S4/HANA that has been implemented. To accommodate this, Melawai Optical IT Division has been developing an intermediary application called ICAPOS. “In other words, this application will allow our POS to interact with SAP S4/HANA. The concept of ICAPOS is to be the bridge of integration. So, in SAP S4/HANA, data that has been pulled from the POS is not data by transaction, but data summary by day. SAP S4/HANA collects and calculates sales daily, while in POS it is by transaction," added Wellie Boenawan.

The results of this implementation can be considered to be able to give Optik Melawai business processes runs smoother. According to Wellie Boenawan, the various obstacles that management used to often encounter, can be resolved now. The various data from departments or divisions in Optik Melawai such as the operational costs in the lab, the use of consumables, the inventory status, and all other costs are now recorded more accurately in detail and in real time.

Regarding the financial reports, today the management can also easily receive any financial statements. For the first time finally, said Wellie Boenawan, the accounting team is able to immediately provide the management with monthly financial report.

On the other hand, the integration of various existing systems and data has made Optik Melawai management is even easier to initiate the development of Big Data Analytics which is currently being implemented. The Big Data Analytics is expected to give Optik Melawai management the ability to accelerate the business growth even faster. "By knowing the real and accurate data such as sales, financial and inventory data, we are getting more willing and confident to expand our business in the future," said Wellie Boenawan.

With Big Data Analytics, Wellie Boenawan said that management will be able to analyze the sales, stock, business, accounting data etc quickly and easily so that they can make the decisions and issue policies more precisely.