The burden of use has forced companies managing chemicals and their applications to isolate ways to organize and develop information interrelationships. This shift in orientation and the dominating value of information as the critical tool in chemical management today is the root of Chemical Lifecycle Management. Gone are the days when you ordered a chemical, used it in manufacturing a good or commodity, and disposed of the drum or container. Concern for employee safety, regulatory requirements and environmental issues have impacted chemical use, inflated handling costs and directly cut into gross margin - generally reducing the overall profitability of business.

Stages as well as the questions and issues surrounding each stage define the chemical life cycle model. When all stages of the life cycle are functionally managed, and information can be accessed quickly, then a comprehensive Chemical Management System (CMS) is in place. By developing information interrelations, Actio's Chemical Management System links all stages of the chemical life cycle, reduces chemical handling and purchasing costs, and provides mission critical information throughout the enterprise.

Stages of the Chemical Life Cycle

Prescreening: Vitally important in preventing potentially hazardous or environmentally damaging chemicals from entering the corporation.

Purchasing: Critical decisions are impacted by the cost of the chemical and the efficiencies gained by purchasing through supply chains.

Assay and Inspection: Chemicals brought on site are purchased based on the grade and price. Knowing these requirements and reviewing the chemical composition prior to acceptance of the inbound shipment eliminates costly mistakes.

Inventory: Tracking controls on order quantity and disbursement afford pinpoint accuracy in inventory location, providing accountability and potential cost savings.

Delivery: Establishing receipt of the chemical at the proper location so it can be bar coded tracked and routed to the requestor.

Use: Application specific utilization determines if a chemical is to be used in small quantity for research, adjusting handling of the chemical which can be substantially different with manufactured quantities.

Waste: The byproducts of manufacturing frequently require waste streams to be tracked and managed. The characteristics of the waste can be entirely different than the raw material chemicals.

Liability: When employees have not been trained on the proper use and application dangers of a chemical or if chemicals used provide a risk to employees, there is a potential liability to the company.

Emergency Preparedness: In case chemicals used during the manufacturing process can be explosive, unstable or highly flammable then local Hazmat teams need to be briefed and prepared for an emergency.

Environmental Health and Safety: Environmental and safety personnel must verify that onsite chemicals are labeled and match the MSDS stored for worker safety. Regulatory reports must be filed in a timely basis or hundreds of thousands of dollars in fines can result. Company goals of HAP reduction and VOC reduction must be initiated, tracked and managed resulting in increases of overhead.

All of the stages of the chemical life cycle have their own unique set of uncertainties and issues. Only Actio's Chemical Management System provides detailed analysis during each phase of the chemical product life cycle wisely managing the information for different departments scattered over various locations.

Today's Chemical Management System

In the past five years two chemical management models have surfaced: the first driven by chemical manufacturers and suppliers attempting to tighten their control of the supply chain, offering greater value to their customers. With industry wide decline in profit margins, enlightened manufacturers look to improved service aspects, as a way to augment these reduced earnings. For the chemical company, such services allow for a reduction of the quantities of chemicals shipped in as much as the inventory, handling, waste processing and reporting mechanisms are now tightly integrated with the product's supply. For the manufacturer the reduction in supply is then offset by a charge for the management service. This model is used in several semiconductor firms. The net result is an overall reduction of chemicals consumed, and a small reduction in costs for the chemical consumer.

The second approach is very similar with the exception that a third party, not the chemical manufacturer, administers it. The third party actually staffs on-site and manages the purchase, inventory and subsequent waste streams of chemicals being utilized in the manufacturing process. This model is generally used in the automotive and aerospace industries. Companies save an average of 10% - 15% with reduced usage, controlling inventory, and having improved environmental and regulatory reporting capabilities with the new found information.

A New Approach

Actio's CMS is a fresh new approach to chemical information management. Rather than outsourcing chemical management to a third party, Actio CMS delivered as an ASP (application service provider) enables you to log into all the benefits of a complete chemical management system without committing to a single chemical supplier or third party manager. Actio CMS provides you with the most comprehensive prescreening available; you can choose from an extensive list of regulations or implement your own directives via a spreadsheet upload. Actio's authorization trees link requestor's, approvers and purchaser's together - bringing a new degree of efficiency to the chemical approval cycle. Regulatory and environmental issues are streamlined with precise micro data available on demand. Remote locations immediately benefit from utilizing chemicals already approved by other locations or divisions. Implementing Actio CMS takes minutes not months and will not only produce enormous efficiencies in chemical purchasing and inventory, but will produce hard cost savings in managing environmental and regulatory information as well. In providing fully scalable integration, Actio's product modules are issue specific, equally capable of independent function and solution delivery, to match needs and plan for growth.