Tata Steel has chosen CA Technologies to help accelerate the innovation of new steel solutions to drive top-line growth.

Tata Steel will use the CA Clarity(TM) Project and Portfolio Management (PPM) to manage the entire new product and service lifecycle from innovation and product design through production and delivery. As a result, Tata expects to achieve a structured approach to innovation which will help drive profitability and competitive differentiation, and enhance customer satisfaction.

"The PPM Solution will help us to more efficiently innovate to speed our products to market, build market share and better align with customer needs," said Rene Kieft, manager, product development portfolio and IP strategy, strategic marketing, Tata Steel. "Efficiency is not about cutting costs, but about using what you have the best way possible, getting the most out of resources and facilities. CA Clarity PPM will enable us to continue to innovate and adapt to customer demands."

Tata Steel has been transforming its European operations into a more customer-focused organization by realigning its internal resources to industry sectors such as automotive, lifting and excavating, energy and power, packaging, construction and rail. This new organizational structure enables Tata Steel to better support customers for success in their markets. By gaining better insight into customer needs and emerging market opportunities, Tata Steel can quickly innovate in ways that better drive company growth.

CA Clarity PPM will be used to better manage this process. By overcoming silos of innovations that previously resided in each business unit, the PPM solution will help optimize Tata Steel's time-to-value and return on investment, by aligning the portfolio of innovation initiatives with the steelmaker's business strategy. Every possible innovation will come under the microscope, ranging from ways to expand and improve the quality and performance of the company's steel products and related service to facilitating new products to be tested on an industrial scale, such as can making, automotive solutions, parts for lifting and excavating equipment and for various construction applications.

"Using CA Technologies Project and Portfolio management solution will help us implement a structured process to our innovation, product design and development process," said Kieft. "CA Clarity PPM will give us the right documents and data to aid the decision making process as well as a structured process to help reduce risk and keep the business focused on doing the right things well. We expect this to help to innovate with customers, get us to market faster and help control costs."

CA Clarity PPM will provide Tata Steel with a single, unified "decision engine" which will capture and hold information about the portfolio of steel products and development projects, and the people and resources that support the innovation activities. This centralized decision engine will enable the company to prioritize the right opportunities, collaborate on developing the right products, and track and optimize the innovation portfolio at every stage. In the renewable energy market, for example, Tata Steel will be uniquely positioned to capture, prioritize and accelerate steel innovations used in the manufacture of wind farms.

"To meet increasing business demands from customers, organizations are using CA Technologies Business Service Innovation approach to help their CIOs, IT and business executives shift from simply maintaining their current portfolios to accelerating the delivery of new, transformative business services," said Lokesh Jindal, senior vice president, Service and Portfolio Management, CA Technologies. "By making better portfolio decisions, more closely aligning investments and enhancing collaborative decision-making, Tata Steel will be able to drive business growth by reducing innovation cycle times and keeping a rigorous focus on the customer."