Reuse strategy delivers 17 sales in the first year with
hundreds more expected!
Background
e-buzz was established
in 1988 as a fully owned subsidiary of the Dutch
application builder kærtSoftware bv. kærtSoftware
products include, among others, the BRIDGE/400
ERP system. e-buzz is headquartered in Hoofddorp,
Netherlands and specializes in the development
and implementation of web-based order management
systems known as the Easy Order® suite. Today
Easy Order® is used by over 1.2 million users
from more than 300 high profile organizations
around Europe, including Ahrend Office Products,
Bavaria, Corporate Express Europe, Despec, Lindell,
Nederlandse Expert Groep, NewCo Europe, Shop
Service Center and Spar Holding. The ‘Software
as a Service’ (SaaS) model has enabled
new customers to be up and running quickly without
costly and time-consuming infrastructure upgrades.
In June 2007, ECI 2 Europe Ltd, a subsidiary
of the US company eCommerce Industries, Inc.
acquired e-buzz. ECI 2, a recognized leader in
the office supplies segment, focuses on e-Commerce
and supply chain integration, so for e-buzz the ‘marriage’ with
ECI 2 was a natural union!
e-buzz’s main product Easy Order®,
can be used to publish clients’ catalogues
on the internet either as Business-to-Business
(B2B) or Business-to-Consumer (B2C) options.
The B2C version can also be used for consumer
websites. Customers and prospects are given access
according to their own pre-defined conditions.
Customers can enter orders online and, at the
same time, they have the option of exchanging
data from their own applications using Easy Order®.
Throughout the development of their range of
software applications, e-buzz has focused on
delivering a number of key benefits and advantages
to its clients, including:
- implementing significant efficiency improvements
- creating a connection between the organization
and its customers
- supplying standardized
software and avoiding unforseen development
costs
- being available as the application
of choice in most languages and currencies
- providing fast, stable and, especially,
scalable software
Easy Order® provides
a web-shop that enables customers to integrate
most of the business administration systems available
in Europe, such as SAP, Navision, Exacta, Progress,
etc. Easy Connect® is for
customers who have access to efficient computerized
systems, and it provides the possibility of exchanging
data without involving the ERP system.
For those organizations who carry a large, international
or highly changeable product range, Easy Catalog® can
reduce the hassles associated with maintaining
such a complex range of products. Suppliers are
given access through the internet to enable easy
updating, authorization and dispatch to business
administration and/or other interested parties.
All products in the Easy suite can be delivered
over the web as SaaS, delivering a number of major
advantages. Costs are reduced because
the customer does not need to invest in hardware,
software, infrastructure, or specialist knowledge.
Costs are also predictable because customers
pay a fixed monthly fee which gives them the
use of all the features offered – 24/7,
without having to worry about system administration.
Challenge
Having successfully developed their new front-end
e-Commerce suite, and with sales of the older
(5250 green screen) Bridge/400 product in decline,
e-buzz decided they could possibly open up a
new opportunity for their business by revamping
their Bridge/400 ERP (back-end) solution and
integrating it with the EasyOrder® suite.
They wanted to get a new product to market quickly
and with minimum risk of failure, so it became
clear that a reuse driven approach was required.
Rewriting the application from scratch made no
sense – Bridge/400 was a feature-rich,
robust ERP application already resident on their
platform of choice – the System i. The
key challenge was to find a reuse based approach
that could transform the 5250 presentation of
Bridge/400 into a modern, web look and feel that
was consistent with EasyOrder® Front Office.
Solution
They researched their options, and discovered
looksoftware through its reseller partner Inform’Aid,
based in Valkenswaard, Netherlands. Having seen
the software demonstrated, they chose to run
with the recently released Version 7 of newlook
which at that time was in prototype.
Having had a bad experience with Java and other
third party tools, e-buzz was pleasantly surprised
at the ease-of-use offered by newlook
and at how quickly they could achieve meaningful
progress
and real outcome “newlook
met our needs perfectly”, said Siebe
Vos, Research & Development
Manager at e-buzz.
With no need to access the 5250 green screen,
and with the same look and feel as its front-end
companion, Easy Order® Back Office was an
instant success with users.
Benefits
"We did not have to rewrite any RPG code,
it is language independent, easy to maintain
and we delivered the recycled application in
only 120 days – an amazing achievement
considering there were 2,000 screens to
modernize!" said Siebe.
e-buzz Managing Director, Pieter Reijnders said, "This
is one of the most exciting phases in our company
history. We have already rolled the new product
out to 17 customers in the first year with an
additional 200 customers achievable over the
next 2 to 3 years."
Siebe lists the following additional benefits
of the looksoftware approach:
- support for secure
SaaS distribution
- easy and fast development
- easy to implement
(little formal training was required)
- easy
to maintain (1 day a month)
- changes require
no testing!
- easy to publish new versions
- SSL security
- portal functionality (integration
with other web environments is possible)
- future
opportunities for desktop integration and SOA
complaint web services
- also, and most importantly,
typical System i users like it!
So, for an application suite with the ‘Easy’ word
all the way through it – looksoftware was
the obvious choice!
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