Bridgestone EMIA overhauls ERP and boosts supply chain agility

Bridgestone EMIA, a global leader in tyre manufacturing and mobility solutions, undertook an ambitious modernization of its ERP landscape, migrating to SAP S4/HANA hosted on Microsoft Azure. Led jointly by the CIO and CFO, the initiative aimed to establish a unified digital backbone integrating 42 business entities across 26 countries. Implementation phased from 2019 to early 2024, interrupted but not derailed by the COVID-19 pandemic. The transformation focused on breaking down data silos, improving master data management, and creating agile, data-centric workflows. Specialist provider Syniti was brought in to streamline and ensure the accuracy of migrated data. TCS supplied a private Azure environment and supported the technical rollout. ERP modernization enabled enhanced cybersecurity, analytics capabilities, adoption of Microsoft PowerApps to democratize technology, and integration with treasury systems. As a result, Bridgestone EMIA achieved a 90% improvement in master data accuracy, accelerated inter-company rebilling, improved reporting and forecasting, and laid the digital foundation for an Industry 4.0 roadmap with plans for virtualization and edge computing. The project also catalyzed organizational change in digital leadership, business partnering, and claim of innovation responsibility by IT across business functions. Ongoing improvements include data governance and new capabilities for cross-company reporting, Capex reporting, and price setting as the organization aspires towards real-time insights and predictive modeling.