We've Been Around Longer Than Google!
Ibex Management Ltd was established in 1998 by Graham Hall, whose philosophy of working while managing the European Petcare supply chains at the Mars Group had delivered tens of millions of pounds of annual savings. But perhaps his greatest satisfaction had come from simultaneously increasing productivity and job satisfaction within his team at the Mars Group even while their numbers were being reduced. In fact, the inspiration for the formation of his new company had come from his belief that people with integrity, who believe in what they're being asked to do, will deliver excellence: hence IBEX.
Ibex's client base was initially UK-centric, but the results we produced in simplifying complex operations brought us to the attention of Price Waterhouse Consulting (as they were then called), and Ibex staff were seconded to lead the Enterprise Planning component of what was then the world's biggest implementation of SAP by Bristol Myers Squibb in North America, working alongside McKinsey Partners in Princeton, New Jersey.
Going Global
By the end of the decade, Ibex had further established a reputation for implementation of state-of-the-art performance in the Efficient Consumer Response (ECR) arena, which attracted international clients, most notably in Australia. Graham himself was seconded to Australia's largest Dairy Company, based in Melbourne, where he accepted a three year contract to transform the efficiency of an international supply chain reaching markets in more than 100 countries. As Supply Chain Director, he led a team of 1,600 staff in a revolution that delivered audited savings of some $600 million (AUD), exceeding the three-year stretch-targets by the end of his second year and thereby underpinning the profitable sale of the company to the NZ Dairy Board.
Exporting Our People
The business model of encouraging senior staff to accept "secondments" led to Ibex itself becoming something of a shell for a number of years while the original employees spread their wings. Graham diversified his own interests to embrace technologies in the Carbon Reduction Economy.
After two secondments as Managing Director within the emerging Renewables industry the lure of Supply Chain Management proved too strong, and in 2013 Graham and James Edgeworth formed a partnership with Montreal-based Foti Group, headed by Graham's eponymous colleague who had overseen the Logistics element of Ibex's Australian Supply Chain reengineering.
Returning to the Supply Chain - Pinpoint Focus
Foti Group was adopted at the beginning of 2016 as one of Ibex's trading identities (in effect, a brand) in the UK, focussed entirely on the provision of Supply Chain Optimisation services and, in particular, the implementation of the world's best warehouse slotting software. This exceptional product can save hundreds of thousands of pounds per year in major distribution centres in picking labour alone.
Optimisation of DC Operations has become our passion, whether as a bounded Logistics initiative or as part of a wider Supply Chain reengineering project. We love what we do, and it shows in the way we do it.
