As one of the leading manufacturers in the field of endoscopy and a provider of networked integration solutions for operating theaters, KARL STORZ is active in over 70 countries worldwide. As part of its continuous development, the global web platform has been redesigned: Structure, content, UX & screen design - the most important navigation and content pages were rethought and consistently aligned with the needs of customers. The technical basis was also further developed and prepared for the requirements of today and tomorrow.
The medical technology company KARL STORZ was founded in 1945 in Tuttlingen, Germany, and is one of the leading international suppliers in the world of endoscopy. Now in its third generation, the family-owned company employs 8,800 people in more than 40 countries worldwide - with 3,000 employees in the Tuttlingen area alone. The portfolio now includes more than 15,000 products for human and veterinary medicine. KARL STORZ stands for visionary design, precision craftsmanship and clinical effectiveness. The global website karlstorz.com is used in more than 90 countries and in a variety of languages. In addition to the content challenges of international multi-site / multi-language scenarios, KARL STORZ also has to take into account the various regulatory requirements of the respective markets. In addition, there are the individual business processes that are typical in B2B scenarios.
CONSISTENT EXPERIENCES & CONTINUOUS DEVELOPMENT
With digital product catalogs, structured product data and a cross-source search, KARL STORZ supports the research phase of decision-makers in human and veterinary medicine, as well as industrial customers. The focus was on a consistent experience across all digital channels in order to present the portfolio in an intuitive and appealing way.
Purchasing and service processes are also supported by the global website for different product segments, regional markets and in up to 9 different languages per country. The marketing automation solution also integrated into the DXP by Intentive ensures that customers receive the content that is relevant to them, despite the large number of market/language/country combinations.
With these requirements, the customer's platform itself exceeds the capabilities of many DXP products designed for typical B2B scenarios. Individual solutions were needed to integrate existing backend systems and new cloud services. As part of an agile development process, Intentive supports the continuous expansion and further development of the customer's DXP in the long term in order to map current requirements and ensure future scalability.
An important component of this is the composable middleware, which Intentive designed and has been consistently expanding for many years. Integrations and new business logic are implemented exclusively in API-based microservices. Over the years, the frontend and backend have been gradually decoupled and prepared for new scenarios, channels and requirements.
CHALLENGE
KARL STORZ's complex product portfolio and the large number of markets and regional regulations require adequate technical solutions for the structured, localized management of marketing and product data.
A customer-centric, personalized user approach is necessary to optimally support the research, purchase and service processes of customer decision-makers. They are increasingly digital natives and expect end-to-end digital processes.
KARL STORZ relied on digital channels early on and gradually built up its own web platform. A greenfield project would mean the loss of existing integrations.
APPROACH
With a view to time to market, a greenfield approach was rejected early on for the relaunch. Instead, traditional integration points such as the CMS are gradually being replaced by modern API-based architecture in a continuous, strategic transformation process.
In this way, previous investments are protected in the best possible way and the platform is nevertheless decoupled via API-based services in the medium term. The middleware approach based on open source components also strengthens the company's digital sovereignty, which was an important secondary objective in the conception phase.
SOLUTION
An attractive front end, good usability and customer-centric digital processes are the visible result of the joint work with the customer on karlstorz.com.
But important foundations were also laid behind the scenes: User interactions can be evaluated not only in email campaigns, but also on the website and used for cross-channel personalized targeting. The increasing use of API-based services drastically reduces the time to market for future requirements. And existing integrations are retained and adapted to new architecture concepts, saving time and costs.
Denis GrobotekKARL STORZ SE & Co. KG
The requirements for our web platform are demanding: in addition to our international orientation, there are also individual regulations as a medical device manufacturer - off-the-shelf solutions do not help. In Intentive, we have found a strong partner for the further development of our custom DXP.
