15 employees, active worldwide, one system: this is how AQUANOVA  AG grows

Frank Behnam (CEO)

AQUANOVA represents a classic mid-sized company, a family-run business. We were founded over 30 years ago by my father. I am now able to continue running the company in the second generation, and we operate in the high-tech sector. We supply the healthcare industry outside pharma and believe that, as a manufacturing company, we are doing something good for people.

Torsten Seck (Director Marketing & Sales)

In our small team, everyone knows their exact skills and responsibilities, and we work with external partners who enable us to operate worldwide.

Frank Behnam (CEO)

Essentially, we focus on formulating plant extracts. We make sure that with as little use of resources as possible, meaning as little plant extract as possible, people get as many of the positive properties as possible. My father developed the technology for this, and we sell it internationally B2B and hope to make a contribution to better health.

Danny Hofeditz (Director Quality & Product Innovation)

We are indeed a very small company with just 15 employees, but we operate internationally, and raw material documentation and traceability are truly bread and butter for us. There is no other way to put it.

Torsten Seck (Director Marketing & Sales)

Previously, we worked with various Excel spreadsheets, and as the volume increased, more and more spreadsheets were needed. That was the point at which we realized that we should switch to a unified ERP system. We now have an overview of the key company metrics at the click of a button, with the help of Business Central, Yaveon 365, and Power BI. In the past, we always had to pull data from several Excel spreadsheets and compile it first.

Frank Behnam (CEO)

We found that with greater growth, isolated solutions and decentralized solutions naturally become a problem. Since we want to keep growing, it is very important to bring standardization into the systems. That is why we decided to introduce an ERP system.

Torsten Seck (Director Marketing & Sales)

In the final selection, we compared various providers. The deciding factors were the Business Central base platform, the industry-specific add-on Yaveon 365, and the good accessibility of the contacts at Yaveon. We tried to disturb operations in-house as little as possible, and worked very closely with the Yaveon consultants to do so. In the end, we met the 12-month implementation target exactly.

During the project, it was reassuring that the Yaveon consultants were always available and could help us with any questions. The industry expertise of Yaveon 365 helps us a great deal with the quality audits of our certification bodies, because we can show how lot tracking is traced in the system.

Danny Hofeditz Director Quality & Product Innovation

Batch tracking used to be a very labor-intensive task for us. In our manual documentation, we had to piece together the individual manufacturing records. With Yaveon 365, it is much easier: With five clicks, you can see all batches and raw materials that were processed in specific products. We need a single system in which all important processes come together. Everything else was gradually phased out over the last few years until we ended up with 100% Yaveon 365.
The new transparency means that we can see at any time which raw materials are in stock. This makes it very efficient to manage orders, inventory, and production planning. Lately, there has been little to no waste here. Our goal is to stay below 1%, and in the last half-year review, we were at 0.6%, so well below that.

Frank Behnam CEO

We are growing continuously, not in huge leaps, but organically, at a rate of between 5 and 10% per year. However, we have founded subsidiaries, most recently in the United States. We do not want to operate the ERP system; it is supposed to support our processes and our growth. With the decision we have made, we will also be able to continue growing well over the next 20 years.
I would measure it by the additional revenue per employee. We do not want to eliminate employees, but on the contrary, we want to attract employees who enjoy working with such systems, on site or from home. That is the metric I would use most readily: more revenue per employee that is truly manageable and still enjoyable.

Torsten Seck Director Marketing & Sales

For us, consistent quality is essential because we pursue high quality standards, which go hand in hand with our corporate responsibility in the food sector.

Frank Behnam CEO

Everything that used to be distributed, in one employee's Excel file and another's Word document, is now integrated. We have a database and end-to-end processes that are directly reflected in financial accounting. We have invested in the standardization of processes and the centralization of data. Today, we can access the ERP regardless of location. That is necessary if you want to grow. I am also thinking about the fact that additional locations will access this ERP system in the future. In that respect, it is an essential building block for further growth.

Danny Hofeditz Director Quality & Product Innovation

At the beginning of our collaboration with Yaveon, we had both options on the table, on-premises or cloud. We ultimately chose the cloud for the long term because of the secure update policy and to avoid the very high initial acquisition costs. In addition, access from outside is always easy, so we can work from home and always have our data where we need it.

Frank Behnam CEO

Yaveon 365 is exactly what we were looking for and found for growth and standardized processes.