It’s not rocket science to master, but you have to discipline yourself to say NO to less important things!

Wolfgang Stausberg
Managing Director, IBS Filtran

Reduce Resources While Increasing Sales

IBS Filtran GmbH, based in Morsbach-Lichtenberg, supplies all renowned automotive and transmission manufacturers worldwide with filter system solutions for automatic transmissions.

15% Reduction

They reduced overhead costs by 15% while increasing sales by 5%.

For more information on this story, contact
Wolfgang Stausberg, Managing Director, IBS Filtran: [email protected]

Goal
While Filtran had been a very successful market leader in a niche application for decades and had grown continuously, it found itself confronted with new challenges, including the industry’s technological transformation towards electrification. As a result, they knew they needed to establish a more economically sustainable approach to their business. Previously, it had defended market share “at all prices,” taking on even less lucrative projects as market-entry opportunities. Unfortunately, this led to the accumulation of excess resources.

Process
80/20 came at the perfect time for Filtran. They used quad analysis to determine which customers and projects (80s) they wanted to serve in the future with the appropriate resources. They identified five accounts as significant key customers.

Filtran’s zero-up analysis defined the resources needed to serve the top one customer above the industry average. Then, they analyzed the remaining customers in declining order (top two to five, and others) in terms of additional resources. In doing so, they found they could save significantly on overhead costs while focusing on future growth.

To bring this “do more with less” mindset to life for employees, Filtran developed a “service tier matrix” for all departments. It showed how services for less critical customers could be reduced or completely terminated to focus on more important customers. It became clear that overall effort could be reduced while improving relationships with key customers, especially in terms of growth.

Results
IBS Filtran reduced total overhead costs by 15% while increasing sales by 5% (Q1 2021 versus Q1 2022), which positively impacted operating profit.

Key Learnings

  • 80/20 trade-offs help extremely to focus on what is relevant.
  • It’s not rocket science to master, but you have to discipline yourself, especially to say NO to less important things!