Nation Wilcox is celebrating 25 years in the IT industry this year. In 1979 Neil Nation and Gordon Wilcox started out on their own in an industry that, depending on age, computer users in the 21st century would find hard to believe or remember. Neil Nation remembers, and he talked to Tommy Leighton.

“When we entered this industry, mainframe computers costing millions of pounds and proprietary business systems shared by a host of companies (via computer bureaux) were the reality,” says Neil Nation. “There was no commonality other than from each manufacturer, IBM, ICL etc., most systems were batch processed via punched cards and those that were interactive were green screen character based. There was still a need for people to understand the requirements of their industries and the ways in which computer technology could be exploited.”

Each manufacturer had its own computer architecture and operating system. “But then the microprocessor came along - among the first commercially available examples being the Intel 8080,” said Nation. “The advent of the Personal Computer and the day when IBM published the spec of its PC to the world and brought everything into the public domain - all of a sudden there were standards by which all other computers could be measured.”

At the time, Nation Wilcox was a distributor for Xerox Computers, a name which in a computer context eventually disappeared into other realms of technology, but at the time was cutting edge. “In reality their technology was the foundation of the PC and Windows. But IBM came along and got into bed with Microsoft. Instead of hundreds of companies making PCs to their own specifications, the whole concept of computing was changed by IBM sharing its blueprint.”

Blowing cover in such a spectacular way was looked on with a mixture of scepticism, pure disbelief and in some quarters awe. But IBM became the biggest PC manufacturer in the world overnight and everyone subsequently implemented systems according to IBM’s design. “They also created a massive marketplace for computer products by doing this,” said Nation.

The only way to compete with IBM was to supply the same, universally accepted product. The catch being that your offer had to be either (a) cheaper or (b) bigger or (c) faster. Economy of scale took on a whole new meaning. From £1,000s per spindle, the cost of disc drives spiralled downwards to less than £500 a spindle (and today some are less than £100). For the 200MB disc drives that were available at the knockdown price of £30,000 in the 1970s, the 2005 market offers a 60-gigabyte disc drive for a PC for less than £200.

“For companies like ourselves, the most difficult part of the job used to be sizing the computer to fit the company. The difference in cost if you ever got the calculations wrong could be many thousands of pounds, so planning and sizing was crucial to the success of the whole process,” said Nation. Since then, however, the answers to those “crucial” questions have become insignificant. “It is now, how many users are going to connect through the system, how many PCs are you going to use, and what applications are involved,” he said.

The first system sold by Nation Wilcox - and the primary reason behind the company’s route into specialisation in the fresh produce industry - was to Central Sales in Coventry Wholesale Market. Like most things in business, fate played a huge role in the direction of Nation Wilcox. “A conversation with Central Sales’ Tony Law was enough to shape a quarter century of our destiny. For Central Sales, Gordon and I authored the code for what became the ISSAC System - a brand that has subsequently become embedded in the fresh produce sector,” said Nation. “We developed it for Tony, but we had one eye on the rest of the industry’s requirements as we did it.

“There were just the two of us working together, and while the whole area of system development is much more regimented now, I still believe that a small team is the most efficient way of doing it. We didn’t have to discuss everything with too many other people. It was bloody hard work, but we enjoyed it immensely and there are now more than 150 sites using the modern-day version of ISSAC in the fresh produce industry.”

The inside knowledge and understanding of the quirks of the fresh produce trading environment are still shared by little more than a handful of IT firms, all of whom, said Nation, have earned the right to be considered specialists in this field. He added: “ISSAC was designed for perishable products and intrinsically that’s the primary characteristic of the system. The whole focus of systems for fresh produce has to be different. I have seen lots of instances where systems have been implemented without the recognition of the fundamental differences that apply to this trade and it invariably costs companies a lot of money.”

While computers are now far more reliable, a multitude of PC users for any one system inevitably means there will be some problems, but the central system that drives those PCs has to be robust, said Nation. “Offices used to send all their data through to the computer department for processing - now everybody does it for themselves. Someone somewhere will therefore surely have a difficulty during each day,” Nation says. “And as a result the support side of our business has become probably the most important factor due to the fact that in this industry just about everything is now done in real-time.”

Perhaps the best example of the changes that have occurred and the response to the ever-increasing need for real-time data capture is the DAP hand-held terminal now in use by over 200 wholesale market salesmen across the UK, courtesy of their relationship with the ISSAC system and Nation Wilcox.

Nation believes the hand-held terminal is the most significant invention for the wholesaler since carbonless NCR paper and the Bic biro. “Like both of those inventions, it took a while to get accepted,” he said. “It was three years from us making a decision to go with them to the point when Bristol Fruit Sales became the first company to accept them and implement them into their business. I can’t speak highly enough of David Matthews (BFS md) for his vision, and together we put a lot of work in to make the thing work. We knew the terminals were right for the situation and would prove successful, but we also wanted to be sure the salesmen were fully-trained and confident in their abilities to use the new technology.”

The rest, as they say, is history. The terminals are now in widespread use across the UK wholesale sector. “There was some initial resistance from the end users, inevitably, but once it became apparent that they were easy to use, quicker, more accurate and also removed the error factor, that soon disappeared. Customers like it because they get a printed ticket, salesman now love it because it makes their job easier and porters love it because they don’t have to worry about the salesman’s hand-writing!” The bottom line, of course, is the bottom line which benefits from sales being entered once at the point of sale. All of the above adds up to one thing - improved profitability.

The hand-held technology has moved swiftly through the gears, with the range of functions and applications extended significantly from the early days already. From stock control to traceability, the options are endless. What next then? Well radio frequency, wireless (Wifi) technology is already becoming more prevalent and an ever larger part of Nation Wilcox’s sales, and now that businessmen can plug mobile phones into laptops anywhere in the world to access their internal business systems, 24-hour remote access opens up the market to a brand new box of tricks.

The challenge is to make those tricks applicable to the industry you are operating in. “What we sell now is 25-years of experience of applying technology to the industry we provide for,” said Nation. “Newcomers into the industry, including the bigger companies that are now targeting this sector, all give credibility to what we and our small group of competitors have been doing during that time and we have set the benchmark for them to compete with.”

Since the meeting with Tommy, Gordon Wilcox has retired. Nation Wilcox is now wholly owned and managed by Neil, Andrew and Linda Nation and Gordon’s daughter Ruth continues in her role as a system project leader with the company.

MAKING IT SYSTEMS AN ASSET

May I start by belatedly wishing all of the readers of the Fresh Produce Journal a prosperous 2005. Failing that and given the vagaries of the industry, perhaps getting through relatively unscathed may be more appropriate.

Since the first of my articles on IT appeared in March of last year, many people have commented on how useful they have proven. The general consensus is that they were written from a business perspective and the usual techno babble or jargon was conspicuous by its absence. I thought that it may be helpful to start the year by summarising the topics covered to date.

In the first article, I focused on the role that IT can play in the business and flagged the fact that with margins continually being squeezed, a well implemented solution could make the difference between success and failure. The consolidation of IT players servicing the industry was noted as well as the entry of global players such as Microsoft & SAP.

The second article provided some insights into how to select an appropriate business management solution. It highlighted the fact this was no longer an IT but a strategic business issue. This suggested cross-company consultation as part of the requirements gathering exercise. Assessing the financial strength of the vendor was stressed as you wouldn’t want to have to change solutions in less than seven years of deploying the new system. Paying attention to the flexibility and future proofing of the selected option was also mentioned.

In the third article, the focus was on identifying a suitable technology partner. The difference between the direct and indirect model was mentioned as well as the importance of evaluating the approach to your enquiry. The technique of carrying out a few basic checks was covered as well as where to gather relevant information.

Having the correct technology infrastructure to deliver your new business information system was the next topic. After all, a poorly built server platform can have a negative impact on the performance of the solution. The article described all of the components that have to work together to deliver stable and secure solutions. The trend towards “thin client” was covered as well as using the power of the internet to provide remote and mobile workers with access to vital updated information economically.

In the next article, the topic of supply chain integration was covered. This stressed the desire of the major multiples to link their systems seamlessly to those of their suppliers as a means of speeding up communication as well as reducing costs.

The last publication posed the question of whether business intelligence in today’s fresh produce industry was a luxury or a necessity. The article highlighted the fact that directors and senior company managers were becoming the highest paid administrators in the business as they struggle to assemble all of the information required to manage the growth of the organisation.

It outlined some of the key performance indicators, alerts and reports that make up a business intelligence solution. It also explained why it was important that these are aligned to the goals of the organisation and that in future executives would need to gauge the performance of the business across all levels. It ended with the quote “If you think that knowledge is expensive, try ignorance”.

Hopefully, summarising the previous articles in this format should help those considering whether their current IT systems are an asset or a liability to the business. These are published in full on our web site at:

http://www.angliabs.com/solutions/solutions_vertical_FP.html

Email: bobr@angliabc.co.uk