Selling modular precision cutters throughout the world

Zünd Systemtechnik AG optimises the sales processes of the cutter series Zünd G3, S3, D3 and L3 by using the product configurator CREALIS®

Zünd Systemtechnik AG

Zünd Sys­tem­tech­nik AG is the lea­ding deve­lo­per and manu­fac­tu­rer of modu­lar pre­cis­i­on flat­bed cut­ters loca­ted in Alt­stät­ten (Switz­er­land). As both a pio­neer and a mar­ket lea­der, Zünd offers the lar­gest ran­ge of the­se modu­lar, uni­ver­sal pro­ces­sing sys­tems with more than 12 mul­ti­func­tion­al tool heads. The inno­va­ti­ve con­cept and design of the G3, S3, D3 and L3 cut­ter fami­lies is the result of Zünd‘s glo­bal tech­no­lo­gi­cal lea­der­ship.

THE TASK

Zünd Sys­tem­tech­nik AG is the lea­ding manu­fac­tu­rer of mul­ti­func­tion­al tool heads and modu­lar pre­cis­i­on flat­bed cut­ters. Fol­lo­wing the launch of the G3 gene­ra­ti­on of Zünd cut­ters, the com­pa­ny iden­ti­fied the need to impro­ve its sales pro­cess by using a pro­duct con­fi­gu­ra­tor. The main objec­ti­ve of the con­fi­gu­ra­tor was to opti­mi­se the quo­ta­ti­on, orde­ring and pro­duc­tion pro­ces­ses. The know­ledge base of the con­fi­gu­ra­tor must include the pro­duct vari­ants spe­ci­fied by Zünd and take into account the spe­cial requi­re­ments of dif­fe­rent mar­kets. The con­fi­gu­ra­tor must be available to the company‘s sale­s­peo­p­le and dis­tri­bu­tors over the inter­net.

THE PROCESS

Zünd Sys­tem­tech­nik AG cho­se the CREALIS® con­fi­gu­ra­ti­on sys­tem,
which has stan­dard func­tion­a­li­ty that covers the company‘s main requi­re­ments. In a three-day work­shop, the rele­vant Zünd employees had the oppor­tu­ni­ty to beco­me fami­li­ar with the func­tion­a­li­ty and para­digms of the CREALIS® sys­tem.
ORISA cus­to­mi­zed the user inter­face of the CREALIS® con­fi­gu­ra­tor and the prin­ted docu­ments to meet the spe­ci­fic requi­re­ments of Zünd. In addi­ti­on to the quo­ta­ti­on docu­ments, which have a fle­xi­ble struc­tu­re, a pre-instal­la­ti­on gui­de is available that is dyna­mi­cal­ly gene­ra­ted with con­tent based on the opti­ons sel­ec­ted. The inter­face to the Sage ERP B7 sys­tem® (Sage Bäu­rer), which was pro­grammed espe­ci­al­ly for Zünd, allows con­fi­gu­ra­ti­on data to be trans­fer­red to the ERP sys­tem effi­ci­ent­ly and cor­rect­ly in the form of an order parts list.
Just after three month the first ful­ly func­tion­al ver­si­on of the con­fi­gu­ra­tor was pre­sen­ted online. During the pro­duc­tion pha­se, a num­ber of users‘ requi­re­ments were imple­men­ted. The­se included enhan­cing the quo­ta­ti­on gene­ra­ti­on func­tion and impro­ving the inter­face design and the pro­duct pre­sen­ta­ti­on. The suc­cessful imple­men­ta­ti­on of the con­fi­gu­ra­tor all over the world gave rise to the need for a cur­ren­cy cal­cu­la­tor as well as a new user-fri­end­ly inter­face tech­no­lo­gy to crea­te docu­ment tem­pla­tes. Sin­ce July 2015 the­re is a inter­face to the CRM sys­tem Sales­force.

THE OUTCOME

The CREALIS® pro­duct con­fi­gu­ra­tor, which was instal­led in June 2008, meets the requi­re­ments of Zünd Sys­tem­tech­nik AG per­fect­ly and sup­ports the sales pro­cess for the G3 ran­ge of cut­ters. CREALIS® allows the available know­ledge about the pro­duct and its con­fi­gura­ble vari­ants to be pre­sen­ted and used in a struc­tu­red, rule-based form. Only cut­ters which are tech­ni­cal­ly fea­si­ble and cor­rect­ly pri­ced should go into pro­duc­tion. An intui­ti­ve user inter­face is a very important fea­ture, along­side the use of cus­to­mers‘ ter­mi­no­lo­gy. The con­fi­gu­ra­tor also pro­vi­des gra­phi­cal sup­port by dis­play­ing dyna­mi­cal­ly gene­ra­ted pro­duct images and assem­bly pic­tures and allows addi­tio­nal gra­phics, pic­tures and docu­ments to be pre­sen­ted. In order to keep the con­fi­gu­ra­ti­on con­sis­tent, the available opti­ons depend on the set­tings ente­red in advan­ce. The con­flict reso­lu­ti­on func­tion allows ban­ned opti­ons to be dis­play­ed and explains the expec­ted con­se­quen­ces if they are sel­ec­ted. The con­fi­gu­ra­ti­on pro­cess is spee­ded up by the auto­ma­tic sel­ec­tion of opti­ons which make sen­se in the con­text or have clear ori­g­ins. The set­tings nee­ded for a com­ple­te con­fi­gu­ra­ti­on are cle­ar­ly mark­ed. After the con­fi­gu­ra­ti­on pro­cess is com­ple­ted, quo­ta­ti­ons and accom­pany­ing docu­ments can be gene­ra­ted. The user can choo­se the con­tent, level of detail, pri­ce com­pon­ents, out­put lan­guage and file for­mats from a wide ran­ge of opti­ons. If the cus­to­mer places an order, the data from the quo­ta­ti­on is trans­fer­red into the ERP sys­tem in the form of an order parts list and is used as the basis for the Zünd pro­duc­tion pro­cess.

THE OUTLOOK

The suc­cess of the con­fi­gu­ra­tor led to the incor­po­ra­ti­on of the second S3 gene­ra­ti­on of cut­ters in 2012. In the fol­lo­wing the cut­ter gene­ra­ti­on L3 and D3 were inte­gra­ted. Fur­ther pro­duct ran­ges will be included at a later date. The cus­to­mi­zed con­fi­gu­ra­ti­on sys­tem has resul­ted in huge time and cost savings in sales and in pro­duc­tion at Zünd Sys­tem­tech­nik AG, becau­se of the impro­ved infor­ma­ti­on pro­ces­ses. The auto­ma­ted gene­ra­ti­on of clear quo­ta­ti­on docu­ments with gra­phics and with all the neces­sa­ry tech­ni­cal and busi­ness infor­ma­ti­on signi­fi­cant­ly speeds up the quo­ta­ti­on pro­cess. The bene­fits of the con­sis­tent pro­cess inte­gra­ti­on include cor­rect order parts lists which are relia­bly trans­fer­red to the ERP sys­tem. The inte­gra­ti­on of the con­fi­gu­ra­tor to the CRM sys­tem pro­vi­des cur­rent cus­to­mer data and infor­ma­ti­on of the sales pro­ject. The result is a signi­fi­cant reduc­tion in the num­ber of errors in orders, tog­e­ther with shorter order through­put times and deli­very times. The pro­duct con­fi­gu­ra­tor is available in six lan­guages and is used on all the con­ti­nents. The mul­ti­ple lan­guage opti­on and inte­gral cur­ren­cy cal­cu­la­tor pro­vi­de sup­port for sales in glo­bal mar­kets.

Wit­hout the pro­duct con­fi­gu­ra­tor we could not manu­fac­tu­re our cut­ters or sell them on the inter­na­tio­nal mar­ket.

- René Hut­ter, CIO / Mem­ber of the Exe­cu­ti­ve Board, Zünd Sys­tem­tech­nik AG

The project in figures

100%

offer pro­ces­sing with the con­fi­gu­ra­tor

50

natio­nal and inter­na­tio­nal working sales part­ners

6

lan­guages available world­wi­de

4

pro­duct lines inte­gra­ted in the con­fi­gu­ra­tor

3

month until the first ful­ly func­tion­al CREALIS® ver­si­on was crea­ted

The customer benefits at a glance

  • Online available

  • Ide­al sales tool by using pro­duct visua­liza­ti­on

  • Quick gene­ra­ti­on of cor­rect quo­ta­ti­ons

  • Sup­port for inter­na­tio­nal sales

  • Huge time and cost savings in the sales and pro­duc­tion depart­ments

  • Reduc­tion in the num­ber of errors in orders, reduc­tion in order lead time