M&H Engineering is a precision machine shop manufacturing highly specialized technological components and assemblies. Operating out of Danvers, Massachusetts, M&H Engineering serves customers in space exploration, medical, communication and military industries.
As research and development in the space exploration and medical industries expanded throughout the 1970s and early 1980s, M&H experienced the pains associated with any successful and growing manufacturer. From the shop floor to the office floor, better coordination of data was needed to ensure the maximum use of production capacity, while also maintaining control of quality customer service.
So it was in the mid-1980s that M&H Engineering found their best fit for enterprise resource planning (ERP) software in Global Shop Solutions.
The Whole ERP Package
When you’re a small- to medium-sized manufacturer with an employee count of 50-100, finding the right ERP software at the greatest value can be daunting. In one instance, the software might be too costly with far too many bells and whistles that you don’t need and will never use. On the other hand, being pigeonholed into a business basics software package not specifically designed for manufacturing may become very limiting very fast. With Global Shop Solutions, M&H Engineering was able to find that happy middle ground – feature-rich manufacturing ERP software at an incredible value.
The whole Global Shop Solutions package is very useful for us, and in this regard, it’s really unlike any system out on the market. We use everything from the general ledger to payroll, the quoting system, inventory control, shop control – the whole package all of the time.
Michael Martens, Administrative Vice President at M&H Engineering
In making full use of their Global Shop Solutions ERP software and having been a user since the 1980s, M&H Engineering realizes significant ROI in the form of shop floor efficiencies. This is particularly true when it comes to the maintenance of work in progress (WIP) and lean processes. Global Shop Solutions gives M&H Engineering the shop oversight that translates into maximized profits from what are often fixed or increasingly reduced margins.
Building Quality One Part at a Time
As a member of the lean supply chain in close tolerance manufacturing, M&H Engineering takes tight control of the shop floor in every aspect of the operation. With M&H Engineering’s 33 milling and turning machines, manned by over 50 employees, Global Shop Solutions’ ability to control costs, through areas such as reduced paper and labor cost reductions, contributes handsomely to the profitability of each job. M&H Engineering’s direct labor costs have decreased through a better accounting of time and attendance.
“We do everything via the online system in terms of time and attendance, and logging in and out of jobs. Also, Global Shop Solutions is especially strong in controlling our materials costs through a shop management capability that accurately accounts for scrap,” observes Martens.
Excellent ERP Customer Service
After three decades of loyalty to a single ERP software provider, you would think that there would be few surprises in their software updates. This is not the case with the successful marriage of M&H Engineering and Global Shop Solutions. Martens believes that this partnership success is the result of Global Shop Solutions’ consistently innovative and forward-thinking research and development, as well as the high level of service they have always provided.
For Martens, “Global Shop Solutions is always there when we need help – even when something out of the ordinary pops up. Global Shop Solutions has a completely different service attitude when compared to its competition.”
To read the full story of how ERP software improved M&H Engineering’s business, download the full case study.