Success Story: INDEX's experience with SAP & SYBIT

The task

While the digitalization of its own machine tools was already in full swing, the INDEX Group's system landscape for marketing, sales, service and e-commerce was still heterogeneous, not fully integrated and in some cases no longer technically up to date. However, it had important information to offer: around 1.5 million relevant data records! The first step was to migrate these to the SAP Sales Cloud.

The old CRM solution had reached its technical limits: the system did not allow mobile use, could not display documents, efficiently support sales processes or be used across countries. There was also considerable manual effort in the service area. On average, the INDEX Group's customer service receives a service ticket every 3 minutes, which employees previously entered manually into the SAP ERP. The lack of an interface between the ERP and the old CRM system meant that the technical field service did not have all the relevant information when visiting customers. Although the INDEX Infoshop had proved its worth, it was also not sufficiently integrated into the system landscape and was technologically outdated. As a result, INDEX was unable to keep pace with the requirements of a modern e-commerce system. 

In order to maintain its market position in the future, the CNC lathe manufacturer opted for a comprehensive, end-to-end digitalization strategy based on the SAP C/4HANA solution suite in combination with SAP AIN and SAP AE from the SAP Leonardo portfolio.

The requirements

The biggest technical challenge was to integrate all systems in such a way that they interlock perfectly. The aim was to guarantee employees efficient working with transparent information provision. A single platform was to provide customers with all the information and services they need to find out about the products, procure them and maintain and service their machines.

In order to be able to work transparently and efficiently in the future, all customer processes should be analyzed in detail and mapped digitally in a transparent manner. In addition to internal sales requirements, such as lead and oppurtunity management, and service-oriented functionalities, such as service ticket management, the main focus was on consolidating all information on the platform. The SAP ERP connection was to enable extensive search functions, access to spare parts and parts lists, including availability and prices, as well as digital machine management.

The result

Over the course of the approximately twelve-month project, iXworld was created as a cloud platform with all the functionalities relating to INDEX customers' machines. It forms the interface between the various customer processes and the digital INDEX world, ensuring that all employees can work efficiently by providing transparent information. The platform consists of four components based on SAP C/4HANA and seamlessly interlinked thanks to optimum integration:

• iXplore provides all important information about the company, products and services and enables machine and quotation configuration
• iXshop is the online store for accessories, spare parts and machine-related services 
• iXservices enables the management of all customer machines, including third-party products for fault and maintenance management, maintenance planning and remote access via smart glasses and teleservice
• iX4.0 is the IoT platform for integrated machine diagnostics and process monitoring and reports information directly to mobile devices

The data handling of the global cloud platform has also been implemented in accordance with data protection guidelines. The collected data is stored in the INDEX area of the SAP cloud and only transferred after local approval if it is required for customer apps.