Bossard implemented EDI Studio to streamline and improve the processing time of document exchange.
Bossard, a 190-year-old company with operations in over 84 locations, is synonymous with fastening and assembling solutions. A global supplier of high-quality screws, fasteners, logistics solutions, and inventory and consulting services, Bossard was looking for a solution to streamline its documentation process with its several trading partners and customers for orders, invoices, delivery advice, and other EDI messages.
Bossard needed a way to manage internal communication between its ERP Dynamics 365 and legacy systems at its central spare parts hub in Switzerland. The company was looking for a solution that could manage not just Electronic Data Interchange (EDI) standards but VDA standard messages as well.
“In the past with Dynamics AX, you could develop enough solutions, such as EDI connections, but that is not what we wanted to do. We were looking for a plug-and-play solution. In terms of security as well, the solutions we opt for are covered by the minimum requirement when it comes to security. And obviously global exposure or experience of the company, so To-Increase did check these boxes. And To-Increase is aligned with our vendor strategy and the partner, so we decided to go with EDI Studio”
- Giuseppe Aruanno, VP Projects and Programs at Bossard Group.
Why did Bossard need a solution?
Bossard employs various systems for processing orders, including OCR tools and their logistics system. Additionally, they also use different formats such as Excel, EDI, and VDA. While they were using D365 F&SCM in certain regions, their central spare parts hub in Switzerland relied on a legacy ERP. So, they needed a solution that could execute orders in different formats and communicate between different business systems for document exchange with trading partners, as well as intercompany communication.
What were the key criteria?
-
A flexible and high-performing solution that could process a large volume of orders
-
A scalable solution covering a global template
-
An EDI tool that could integrate with D365 F&SCM
-
A reliable company that has worked with international customers
-
A configuration-based solution
Why did Bossard choose EDI Studio for D365 F&SCM?
Bossard evaluated several software possibilities, narrowing down their choices to a competitor and To-Increase. Since Bossard was looking for a flexible solution and EDI Studio is embedded in D365 F&SCM, the scales tipped in our favor. Additionally, they had a tight deadline and needed more control over their project. With our solution, they gained a toolbox that they could use to configure and extend EDI messages in-house, after receiving the required assistance and training to implement EDI Studio from To-Increase’s Consultants.
How is EDI Studio an effective solution for Bossard?
Bossard used EDI Studio to send intercompany messages to other legal entities within D365 F&SCM, as well as to communicate with their central spare parts hub that was using a legacy system. Since the legacy system had extra fields, they were able to add placeholders for those fields and send the messages to their spare parts hub. They used a Purchase Order Inquiry message with extra fields to streamline the order-to-delivery process using EDI Studio. They extended their messages over a period of time and now use one message of each type to integrate with D365 F&SCM. They have configured several messages including Delivery Advice, Invoice, Order Confirmations, DELFOR, and a few more. And they also plan to add messages based on business requirements.
“We can do slightly different things with the same message and so the numbers are quite high. Last year we had 17,000 orders created using To-Increase EDI Studio and that is only in one legal entity since go-live, so that is quite a lot. That is only incoming orders so if you multiply that with all the other messages it is thousands and thousands that have gone through.”
- Henri Koponen, Solution Architect at Bossard Group.
Some of the benefits that Bossard saw after implementing EDI Studio
-
The tutorial messages helped the team quickly get started with simple messages
-
EDI Studio provided a flexible platform to configure the messages based on business needs.
-
Any changes to data mapping could be executed rapidly and independently by the Bossard team.
-
Data sharing to legacy systems with different naming structures could be shared using constant values.
-
EDI Studio could handle tons of orders during mass testing which gave the team the confidence in the solution’s capacity to scale to business requirements.
The above points highlight just a few of the benefits. For the complete story, you can download the entire case study from the link below
