Quality of Operations™, Food Safety, and IT Due Diligence Identified ERP and WMS Risks

A fast-growing producer and distributor of ethnic food.

The Challenge

TriVista was hired to conduct a Quality of Operations™, Food Safety, and IT Due Diligence assessment on a producer and distributor of dry packed food goods.

Our Approach

TriVista conducted a due diligence assessment of key business value streams and associated IT support systems with a focus on:

• Assessing ERP system business enablement, scalability, and reliability to support the investment thesis
• Evaluating warehouse systems and operations to gauge maturity of operations, continuous improvement processes, and system capabilities
• Performing a benchmark assessment across all IT processes to identify key risks and opportunities for improvement
• Assessing talent management, project management, culture, and labor utilization tools and techniques
• Evaluating cybersecurity profile to identify risks and gaps in support of diligence and reps & warranties underwriting

The Results

No operational red flags were identified during the assessments, but warehouse process flow inefficiencies were primarily driven by warehouses operating on dual ERP and WMS platforms instead of a universal solution. TriVista issued a QOO™, Food Safety Assessment, and IT due diligence report with the following post-close recommendations:

• Optimizing the application landscape with ERP enhancement and migration projects, application integration projects, and building an enterprise-wide data warehouse
• Hiring a CIO to support business growth
• Resolving ERP and WMS duplication to enable significant efficiencies improvements including warehouse flow, advanced warehouse processes, labor efficiency, and capacity increases
• Partnering with a cybersecurity firm to conduct an audit and penetration test, prioritize improvement plans based on results, and maintain an incident response plan
• Implementing best practice tools, training, and policies to reduce potential cybersecurity vulnerabilities, including web filtering, awareness training, phishing testing, mobile device management, and removable media protection