Gühring: B2B shop and customer portal for 20 countries, integrated with SAP
ECOPLAN has supported the B2B platform of Gühring, one of the world's leading manufacturers of precision tools for metal cutting, since 2016. A single central solution runs 30 websites for 20 countries with around 250,000 products and variants, integrated with the different SAP systems of the sales organizations.
20
Countries where the platform runs
30
Country and brand websites on one platform
250,000
Products and variants
36%
less download volume thanks to usage statistics
Key facts at a glance
Customer
Gühring KG, Albstadt-Ebingen
Industry
Tool industry, rotating precision tools
Website
www.guehring.com
ECOPLAN customer since
2016
Scope
30 websites, 20 countries, two to three languages per website
Products
Around 250,000 products and variants, up to 40 downloads per product
Solutions
B2B web shop, customer portal with document portal and contracts, PunchOut via OCI and cXML, order automation via tool dispensing machines
ERP
SAP ECC, SAP S/4HANA, and SAP Business One, depending on the sales organization
Other systems
PIM, product configurator
Rollout
Germany in a few months, further countries in some cases in a few weeks
About Gühring
Gühring KG, headquartered in Albstadt-Ebingen, develops, manufactures, and sells rotating precision tools for metal cutting. Around 7,000 employees work at more than 70 production sites in 48 countries. Customers include companies from the automotive, aerospace, and mechanical engineering industries, tool specialty dealers and industrial distributors, as well as smaller manufacturing and metalworking businesses.
Starting situation
Gühring already had an online shop, but it was technically outdated and little used by customers. The company was looking for a partner that understands the processes and structures of an internationally operating industrial company and can reliably integrate the different SAP systems of the sales organizations.
The decision in 2016 went to ECOPLAN, because of its many years of experience in industrial B2B and above all its SAP expertise.
Approach and rollout
ECOPLAN first implemented the platform for Germany, with go-live after a few months. Further countries and sales organizations followed, some within a few weeks. All websites run in a shared instance. Central standards apply to all countries, while local specifics such as languages, product ranges, and terms are modeled per sales organization.
Integration
Different SAP systems are in use in Gühring's sales organizations: SAP ECC, SAP S/4HANA, and SAP Business One. ECOPLAN integrates all of them with the same platform. Prices and availabilities come at runtime from the SAP system responsible in each case.
The B2B shopping cart, a one-page checkout, bundles all the information SAP needs for the order simulation, including shipping costs, shipping carriers, and individual customer terms. Product data is delivered by a PIM system via API, and the existing product configurator is also integrated.
What was not easy
The biggest challenge is the volume of data. Around 250,000 products and variants must be kept up to date from PIM and ERP, be quickly searchable, and be displayed with good performance. To achieve this, ECOPLAN has above all continuously optimized the indexing of the product data over the years.
To help customers quickly find the right product among this variety of variants, ECOPLAN integrated the specialized search solution Zoovu. Gühring wanted to be able to control specifically which products appear at the top of the search results, for example to show new products preferentially.
In addition, there are up to 40 downloads per product: technical data sheets, design information, and CAD files in numerous formats. ECOPLAN developed a cross-country statistic that shows which downloads in which format are actually used, because user behavior differs from country to country. On this basis, the data volume was reduced by 36%.
Special features of the solution
Contracts in the customer portal
Fixed purchase quantities in exchange for better prices and availability.
Gühring can plan production better. In the customer portal, customers see open contract quantities and statistics.
Order automation via tool dispensers
Withdrawals automatically become reorders.
Withdrawals at tool dispensers at the customer's site trigger reorders through configurable order rules.
PunchOut via OCI and cXML
Order directly from the customer's procurement system.
The cart in the shop is transferred to the customer's procurement system via OCI or cXML.
Document portal
Orders, delivery notes and invoices in the portal.
Customers access their documents in the portal themselves.
Result
With ECOPLAN, Gühring has replaced an outdated, little-used shop with a central B2B platform that now serves 30 country and brand websites in 20 countries. New countries can be integrated within a few weeks.
Continued development since 2016
Since the launch, ECOPLAN has continuously expanded the platform together with Gühring: further countries and sales organizations, customer portal and document portal, contract processing, the integration of the configurator, and PunchOut via OCI and cXML. New platform features are used on an ongoing basis, and further countries are in planning.
Customer voice
ECOPLAN understands how an international industrial company ticks. Today we bring new countries live in a few weeks.
Related topics
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