Ahmedabad (Gujarat) [India], May 1: The "Global Digital Transformation Leader" title is bestowed upon an individual who helps an organization implement digital transformation and adopt digital technology to increase value through innovation, invention, customer experience, or efficiency.

In 2023, digital transformation can firmly be regarded as the apex of a company’s stride towards the future, to the extent that it is virtually impossible to overstate the impact it can yield. ERP has been in the market since the advent of the 1990s, with preceding systems having been in place since as early as 1913. Its adoption and significance have grown immensely since the 90s and still continue to, as newer and more advanced versions of it come out.

Ravi Dave has been instrumental in the digital transformation of a multitude of organizations over a span of 13 years. He believes that technology can help organizations secure a competitive advantage and has proved the same time and again.

Ravi, currently leading a critical role in launching Lakeshore Learning Materials’ new ERP system, started out by implementing SAP Purchasing, Inventory, and Account Payable solutions over at Guilford Performance Textiles, which resulted in impressively increased productivity and savings of over $500,000 annually.

After Ravi’s impressive feat at Guilford, Lear Corporation, an American automotive brand ranking in the top 150 on the Fortune 500 list, benefited substantially from implementing SAP Automobile solutions. Ravi was instrumental in designing and delivering global end-to-end procurement solutions that worked wonders in terms of streamlining the company’s various departments and unlocking new levels of efficiency. Lear realized the benefits of SAP solutions, including inventory optimization and a single instance of SAP ERP.

Ravi's efforts at Guilford and Lear's successful transition to SAP earned him the "Shining Star" award.

Ravi’s next enterprise was in 2016 when Procter & Gamble announced the transfer of Duracell to Warren Buffet’s Berkshire Hathaway with a very aggressive divestiture plan. Ravi once again made a critical resource in leading the transition on the SAP Warehousing solution and completed the transition within the stipulated timelines.

Digital transformation taps the true potential of technology and maximizes resource utilization within an organization. Today, it’s about bringing in systems that are capable of supporting the organization’s vision of itself and realizing it in the future. This process involves upgrading from ERP systems that limit the organization’s growth and even adapting the business to the technology investments that the organization has made.

At Composites One — one of the largest distributors of composites materials in North America, Ravi was the Lead & Architect for the source-to-pay and demand-to-supply team, where he supported the company's digital transformation from MXP, a legacy system (an outdated computing software and/or hardware that is still in use), to SAP S/4 HANA — a much more advanced ERP software. SAP's solution helped Composites One to overcome multi-country, multi-currency, and decimal limitations, apart from upgrading several other business processes.

At Lakeshore, Ravi is leading a critical role in launching a new ERP system, one of the five company priorities that will enable Lakeshore to push more efficiently towards their $2B Moonshot! The new system will give the company one source of truth about inventory, visibility to Lakeshore products by location, efficiency, productivity, and better customer service.

Ravi Dave firmly believes that by leveraging technology, organizations can streamline processes, increase transparency, and gain valuable insights into performance and market trends. This, in turn, enables informed decision-making, cost reduction, and better customer service, making way for a more sophisticated way of doing business.