Case Study: Pimcore PIM as Single Source Database
Van Iperen International is a Dutch producer of Specialty Fertilizers and Biostimulants for fertigation and foliar application. Their employees speak 30 languages and serve clients in over 100 countries.
Pimcore PIM and DAM have been set up to gather all data necessary for automating several documents that were previously handwritten in Word or Indesign. Massive data inheritance and cell override are used to boost productivity and improve data consistency. "Leaflet" database publishing software connects live to output documents on demand in 30 languages. Both software are Unicode compliant. The website also receives data through standard web services.
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Automation: Shifting gears to write and format complex product sheets
Van Iperen’s products are documented through several documents like product leaflets and technical data sheets. These documents were manually layouted in Indesign, mixing previous versions with newer data gathered from various sources (Excel, Word, or Outlook files). Each document contains a lot of data in tables. The original process was time-consuming and slowing the process of product renewal, translation, and expansion to other brands. At the same time, two other subsystems were requesting reliable data coming from a computer database: The new website and a calculation module.
Fulfill every need with the wide range of Pimcore features, like a puzzle
Bulk products are sold under several brands or private labels. Data inheritance and cell override are used extensively. Placeholders in texts make them generic, and calculated fields are defined for brands so that each database product corresponds to several real-world products. With combinations of brands, languages, and document types, each article in the database has more than 100 simultaneous document versions. Pimcore “classification stores” contain hundreds of attributes to determine the detailed chemical composition of each product. All the data entries are interfaced in real-time through the Pimcore web services added to ease communication. User role definition are tuned to give restricted access to translators to work in custom side-by-side screens. Versioning is a welcome safeguard to monitor data quality over time and make people accountable for it. The integrated Pimcore DAM gathers all CMYK pictures for PDF documents and converts them to RGB pictures for the website.
Looking back, one of the best ICT development and implementation processes within VII
Installing the Pimcore PIM database serving three subsystems (PDF product documents, website, and calculation module) was key to project success and personnel productivity. This project was completed with very few people, and it is not anticipated more personnel will be needed in order to keep the new systems running. The single-source database that feeds all subsystems and the automation of the production of documents give the marketing department adequate tools to concentrate on seizing opportunities and conquering new markets at a sustained pace. The budget of the whole project was attractive and helped Van Iperen go for it at a moment when the outcome was full of uncertainty. You can rely on quality open-source software like Pimcore.