Kiwi Brands achieve Y2K compliance.

Kiwi Brands Australia, a division of Sara Lee/Douwe Egberts, was not unique in facing the Y2K dilemma with its BPCS version 4.03 manufacturing system.

The main criteria in evaluating the available options were to make the systems year 2000 compliant with the minimum impact on users and the business, with the least amount of risk, and the solution also needed to be cost effective.

Largely due to the substantial user input required, it was not felt that the timing was right to undertake an upgrade to a year 2000 compliant version of BPCS (version 6 Client/Server or version 4CD).

In evaluating the tools available to enable Kiwi to become Year 2000 compliant, Andrew Mihelyi, believes that, "The MS4 date encapsulation method stood out as the solution that best met our needs, providing a solution with a low impact on our system and as a result our users. Essentially, MS4 minimised the risks normally associated with such a project".

The MS4 software was loaded, the date fields were identified, encapsulated, and the programs were modified over a five day period with the assistance of Millennium Solutions. In the remaining eight weeks of the implementation project, the converted system was tested and a small number of corrections were made to the MS4 modified programs.

The Year 2000 version of BPCS has now been successfully running live since the third quarter of 1997.

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