What challenges did Avocados From Mexico face before AI implementation?

Complex and inefficient purchase requisition experience for marketing and purchasing specialists Manual processes created bottlenecks and consumed excessive time (15 minutes per requisition) Limited visibility into approval processes and critical purchasing data Need to future-proof with extensibility and scale as the organization grows

What was the impact of the AI solution?

Reduced requisition creation time from 15 minutes to under 1 minute Saved 34.5 hours per month for marketing team Improved process accuracy and reduced errors Enhanced visibility and user experience for both staff and management

Source

Microsoft

Avocados From Mexico revolutionized purchasing workflows for marketing efficiency

Use case typeBusiness process automationUpdated Jun 13, 2026

Avocados From Mexico (AFM), a non-profit with more than 30 employees in the food sector, was experiencing bottlenecks and inefficiencies in its purchase requisition process, particularly for the marketing team working under tight deadlines. In 2017, AFM adopted SAP Business ByDesign but found the system complex and time-consuming for purchasing specialists. AFM needed a scalable solution to streamline this workflow and provide better visibility and process automation. Lantern, acting as an ad-hoc CIO, implemented Microsoft Power Platform, integrating with SAP for seamless requisition approval and data reconciliation. Dataverse was leveraged for the approvals process while Power BI and Microsoft Fabric were used for analytics and data-driven insights. The transformation enabled faster, mobile, and user-friendly approvals, drastically reducing errors and the workload for purchasing staff. The process time dropped from 15 minutes to less than 1 minute, resulting in monthly savings of 34.5 hours, enhanced visibility, and greater operational efficiency. Teams and Outlook integrations are planned to further improve the workflow. Lantern continues to support AFM with further projects in automation, data analytics, invoice processing, and AI-driven automation initiatives.

Organization: Avocados From Mexico
Industry: Consumer & Food
Location: United States
Published: January 2024

Reported outcomes

34.5 hours

timeTime & speed

15 minutestime1 minutestime

Strategic outcomes

Speed & agilityStreamlined requisition approvalsCustomer experience & trustImproved user experienceBetter decisions & insightEnhanced visibility into purchasing dataScale & capacityBuilt scalable procurement workflow

Primary read

Use case focus

Showing 3 of 3

1Automated Purchase Requisition Workflow for Food Marketing
2Analytics-driven Purchase Approvals
3Mobile-enabled Approval Automation

Complex and inefficient purchase requisition experience for marketing and purchasing specialists
Manual processes created bottlenecks and consumed excessive time (15 minutes per requisition)
Limited visibility into approval processes and critical purchasing data
Need to future-proof with extensibility and scale as the organization grows

Implemented Microsoft Power Platform, integrating with SAP Business ByDesign and Dataverse for automated approvals and data reconciliation
Used Power BI and Microsoft Fabric for advanced analytics and visibility
Enabled mobile, Teams, and Outlook-based requisition approvals (some in progress)
Partnered with Lantern for strategy, solution design, and ongoing support

Technologies

Power Platform SAP ByDesign Power BI Microsoft Fabric Teams Outlook Dataverse

Reduced requisition creation time from 15 minutes to under 1 minute
Saved 34.5 hours per month for marketing team
Improved process accuracy and reduced errors
Enhanced visibility and user experience for both staff and management

Architecture

Purchase requisitions are submitted through a Power Platform application, with Dataverse handling approval workflows. Data is reconciled back into SAP ByDesign. Power BI and Microsoft Fabric provide analytics and dashboards. Planned integrations include Teams and Outlook for further workflow automation.

Implementation partners1

Lantern

Sources & evidence1

Groundedness: Unavailable

Primary source

AI-generated summary. Verify important details with the linked sources before relying on this case.

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Customer evidence