Meatworks software attracts attention

Information technology and consulting company Infinity Solutions is getting inquiries from around the world for its Meatpro solution, a version of Microsoft's Navision suite modified for use in the meat industry.

Enterprise systems manager Nicholas Johnson said that while Microsoft's licensing arrangements meant Infinity could not sell Navision in other countries, it could sell its modifications and templates.

Meatpro has been picked up across the Tasman by Telstra-owned systems integrator Kaz, which recently sold it to Western Australia meat processor Harvey Beef. Inquiries have also come from Russia and Indonesia.

Navision typically sells to middle-sized customers, and Meatpro is aimed at companies with revenues of $100 million to $200 million.

Johnson said Infinity began by customising the core Navision application for specific customers, but over the past year it turned that work into a product.

"There are a number of Navision resellers in Australasia, so we had to find a way to differentiate ourselves," said Johnson.

"We decided to focus on the meat industry and meat marketing."

That meant hiring not only people with Microsoft and Navision skills, but people with meat industry experience.

"That is most important. It does not matter how far the product advances, it will always need a set of services from people who have the domain knowledge and can talk to customers in their own language and terminology," said Johnson.

Meatpro is now used by seven New Zealand companies, and could go into other Navision sites where Infinity has recently picked up support contracts, "It is also leading to us getting interest from other companies in the food industry," Johnson said.

Infinity tweaked Navision to handle everything from procurement to the boning room, through to packing processed cuts into a container and exporting it.

Data is picked up directly from scales and scanners on the meatworks floor.

"The big issue there is when you start cutting up the animal, you have dual units of measure - kilograms or cartons.

"Most systems aren't built to handle that," Johnson said.

"You need to track dual measurements from a financial perspective so you can measure what you are producing.

"It has to do valuation and revaluation of stock, because price can fluctuate."

Meatpro integrates with other packages which are used to generate documents for MAF certification, customs and shipping.

"We started off trying to generate them ourselves, but regulations are always changing and we realised we would be better off leaving that to the vendors who specialise in that area. They concentrate their effort on that, and they are able to spread the development cost over more customers."

Infinity's Navision practice now has 20 staff, compared with a handful two years ago.