Kito Crosby Drives Best On-Time Delivery in a Decade with SAP Cloud ERP Private Transformation

Kito Crosby has moved to SAP Cloud ERP Private (formerly RISE with SAP)as part of a broader effort to unify its global operations and replace fragmented legacy systems. The shift has already delivered tangible gains, including the best on-time delivery performance in a decade, alongside reduced back orders, improved inventory accuracy, and higher warehouse throughput.

The lifting and securement solutions provider, which has expanded through multiple acquisitions, faced a patchwork of outdated and disconnected ERP systems that limited scalability and process integration. To address this, the company adopted a greenfield approach under its SAP Cloud ERP Private journey, establishing a single global ERP instance built on standardized processes.

Moving from Fragmentation to a Unified Digital Core

Kito Crosby, which specializing in the design and manufacturing of high-performance hardware and lifting equipment makes critical components including, hooks, shackles, chain hoists, and wire rope clips, which are used across industries like oil & gas, construction, and mining.

The company owns multiple brands, including, Kito, Crosby, Harrington, Gunnebo Industries, Peerless, and eepos. With each acquisition, the company’s IT landscape had become increasingly complex as the business scaled from millions to billions in revenue across multiple brands.

Johnson Lai, chief digital transformation officer and chief information officer, said, “In the past, we did not integrate our ERP systems, and this left our IT landscape very fragmented and limited our business process capabilities. Therefore, we wanted to refresh all of our ERP systems and really lay down a greenfield start that we can begin to create a transformational change for the entire company.”

A clean core strategy, prioritizing standard SAP functionality over customization, enabled the integration of key processes such as order-to-cash, manufacturing, accounting, and shipping within a single system, SAP said.

This approach also gave the company an opportunity to reassess core processes and simplify operations, particularly in areas such as warehouse management and sales and operations planning, Lai explained.

The transformation began in North America, where legacy system risk was highest, with plans to expand globally as part of a broader ERP consolidation strategy.

Clean Core Approach Drives Process Standardization

By adopting a greenfield deployment, Kito Crosby effectively rebuilt its ERP environment from the ground up. This allowed the company to rethink core processes and align operations with standardized best practices.

However, the shift required significant organizational change. Leadership noted that while teams initially supported the clean core approach, resistance emerged when business units faced the reality of reduced customization.

“Everyone agrees to the clean core approach until it’s their turn to look at their function, at which point they want customization. There was a piece of resistance to using ‘vanilla’ functionality,” Lai said. “Once we showed people live demos with their own data, that’s when the change resistance started to decrease,” he added.

Demonstrating system capabilities with real data helped drive adoption and reduce pushback. “Now some of the folks who questioned why we outsourced some of that to SAP are our biggest champions…We find working with the SAP team is no different than working with ourselves,” Lai noted.

Operational Gains Across Supply Chain and Manufacturing

Since going live, Kito Crosby reports measurable improvements across key operational metrics, including its strongest on-time delivery performance in more than a decade.

The company reduced back orders, improved inventory accuracy, and stabilized supply chain execution across brands. It also streamlined intercompany transactions and increased warehouse productivity, reaching record volumes in receiving, replenishment, and shipping while handling higher throughput with the same operational footprint.

These gains were accompanied by more efficient resource utilization and improved safety outcomes, highlighting how process standardization and a unified ERP core translated into tangible, day-to-day operational improvements.

Building an AI-Ready ERP Foundation

With its core ERP environment now standardized, Kito Crosby is positioning itself for the next phase of transformation.

The company plans to extend its SAP Cloud ERP Private deployment globally, including migrating remaining SAP ECC systems in Europe. The clean core foundation is expected to accelerate upgrades and enable faster adoption of new innovations.

This includes leveraging AI capabilities embedded within SAP’s cloud ERP environment to support decision-making and operational optimization at scale.

What This Means for SAPinsiders

Clean core must be proven with operational wins. Kito Crosby tied standardization directly to measurable outcomes like decade-high on-time delivery and higher warehouse throughput. For SAPinsiders, anchoring clean core decisions to specific KPIs early can help justify trade-offs and sustain executive support.

Adoption accelerates when users see their data in action. Kito Crosby reduced resistance by demonstrating SAP standard processes using live, business-specific data rather than abstract models. This suggests that targeted pilots and data-driven demos can be more effective than broad change programs in driving fit-to-standard adoption.

Greenfield programs enable process redesign, not just system replacement. The company used its greenfield approach to rethink S&OP, warehouse operations, and intercompany processes alongside ERP consolidation. Enterprises can extract more value by pairing ERP transformation with process redesign in high-impact areas like supply chain and fulfillment.