Company: Alcan

Annual Return: 1,026%

Project: The aluminum producer used software from iWay Software to integrate a host of disparate systems supporting manufacturing, supply chain, financial and logistics. With the systems tied together, Alcan was able to build self-service portals for employees, customers and partners to get inventory, human-resources and procurement information and conduct transactions.

Benefits: An e-commerce system that was expected to cost $500,000 to develop came in at $160,000. The employee benefits site came in at $15,000, instead of $180,000. A $600,000 investment in brokering transactions between a variety of manufacturing and logistics systems produced $12 million in annual savings.