Nippon Gases moves its data-driven model forward with Tableau

Nippon Gases, part of Nippon Sanso Holdings Corporation (NSHD), is one of the leading suppliers of industrial and medical gases in Europe. With over 150,000 customers in sectors as diverse as metallurgy, wastewater treatment, healthcare and the food, chemicals and pharmaceuticals industries, it is present in 13 countries, with a range spanning anything from the most efficient supply option to applications technology solutions tailored for every customer or partner. And it does all this with a clear vision: to create social value through innovative gas solutions that increase industrial productivity, improve human wellbeing and contribute to a more sustainable future.

The Information Technology (IT) department provides global support to Europe based on the principle that digitalization is the basis for innovation. In this respect, Nippon Gases is firmly committed to new technologies, and has set itself the goal not only of optimizing its efficiency, but also of improving customer experience and service. 

The importance of data is ingrained in the company DNA, and the company has always paid particular attention to analytics. This vision was enhanced even further after its incorporation into NSHD (at the time TNSC - Taiyo Nippon Sanso Corporation) in 2018. As director of Enterprise Applications at Nippon Gases, Elena López recalls this “was a turning point for us, because the European business had to start operating independently, and with that in mind we had to manage all our own applications”. It was at this point that the company placed its trust in the supplier it already had, Tableau, to cover its analytics needs.

The initial situation was characterized by the existence of diverse analytics tools. “We couldn’t maintain our entire portfolio of analytics tools and we took advantage of the situation to consolidate,” the director points out. Despite the fact that, of the three tools implanted in the organization Tableau was not the most widely-used one, the balance tipped in its favor because “it was the one we saw as best placed on the market, with extremely good visual capacities. And on top of this it was easy to learn and simple to use”.

After a successful initial phase, when efforts focused on the migration of the rest of the analytics tools to Tableau, the latter has become an absolutely cross-cutting solution at Nippon Gases. “Although there is still some way to go in terms of implementation in certain businesses and regions, Tableau is present in many areas of the company, adapted and focused on the needs of each department,” says Ángel Montero, the company’s Data Analytics Manager.

Implantation began in the Operations department, as this was where it had been used most intensively in the past, and it quickly expanded to other departments like Accounting, Accounts Receivable, Distributor Sales, Accounts Payable to suppliers or the Technical Services department for all the operations of technicians dealing with installations, corrective or preventive maintenance etc.

“In Accounts Receivable, for example,” Elena López explains, “it plays a fairly significant role, because for us, financial KPIs are very important, such as (Days Sales Outstanding) or aging in order to see, customer by customer, what the situation is in terms of payment collection, default, deviations, etc., and make decisions based on this”.

Given the size of Nippon Gases, with 130 production plants and over 600 trucks undertaking distribution to supply its broad network of customers throughout Europe on time, the Enterprise Applications Director points out that “our main cost in our production and distribution process is always energy and transport, so many of the analyses we carry out will optimize these two areas”.

As such, the Operations department plays a leading role. Jesús Gallego, the European Director of this department, which covers the air separation plants that produce oxygen, nitrogen and argon, and the coordination of distribution, explains how the analytical capacity provided by Tableau translates into improved processes and cost savings. 

Likewise, the analytical power Tableau provides is also used to make proactive decisions. Jesús Gallego illustrates this point by explaining how analytics are applied to the process data of a compressor in a production plant. “By analyzing all of the variables that are involved and visualizing these calculations, Tableau can give us an early warning before an incident such as overheating occurs”. 

Forewarned, the Operations department can make preventive decisions, helping to improve the availability and reliability of the production plant. “Without Tableau, this could not be have done previously, because we had no way of visualizing so much data,” says the Director. It is now also possible to gain a complete overview of all of the production stops that have occurred in plants, and as a result the cause will sometimes lead to a technical bulletin being sent out to the other plants in order to prevent similar incidents.  

The advantage of Tableau lies not only in massive process automation, but also in the fact that if changes occur in consumption patterns, the update is automatically reflected in the analysis, allowing for improvement in the service provided to customers and ensuring a continued, reliable supply of gas in line with their needs.