The customer
The abbreviation "FEGIME" stands for "Fédération Européenne des Grossistes Indépendants en matériel électrique" (European Federation of Independent Electrical Wholesalers). FEGIME Deutschland GmbH & Co KG (FEGIME) is made up of around 45 family-run electrical wholesalers. FEGIME Deutschland was formed over decades through mergers of medium-sized market communities. The shareholders have a turnover of approx. 2.4 billion euros (2023) in Germany and are represented at over 160 locations (details: https://www.fegime.de/ueber-uns/)
The problem - 15 years of Techdebt
As a market community, it is very important for FEGIME to bundle the coordination and communication of its companies in one place. To achieve this, it relied on a self-developed extranet that has served it well for 15 years. The extranet was operated and developed internally, but it was based on a monolithic architecture and had reached its limits in many areas after this long period.
On the one hand, there were many problems in the areas of design, UI and UX as well as performance, and on the other hand, there were technical problems in the development of new functions. The day-to-day use of the extranet was becoming increasingly difficult and cumbersome for FEGIME and its shareholders. The operation and maintenance of the system also became increasingly difficult due to a generational change in internal IT.
Our task was to develop a new extranet that had to fulfill the following objectives:
- Centralized information management
- Efficient communication (internal, external)
- Strict legal system to meet regulatory requirements (antitrust law)
- The core values of FEGIME were to be reflected in the new extranet
- Structured document management
- Cost reduction through simpler processes and scaling
- An intuitive design with optimized UI and UX that simplifies working with the extranet
A new extranet
During the first workshop for the new extranet, it quickly became clear that a lot of fundamental conceptual work was needed before development could begin. The old extranet had grown over a period of 15 years. Complexity had to be removed from the system without losing crucial processes, while new functions were implemented at the same time. As the extranet contains sensitive and economically critical information for the shareholders, the issue of data sovereignty also had to be taken into account in the design.
In addition to this conceptual work, various interfaces, for example to stores and databases, also had to be planned in order to manage the community's four million articles.
Of course, all of this had to be extremely high-performance and attractively designed for the users on the FEGIME and shareholder side who use the extranet on a daily basis.
In addition, the new extranet should be based on a modern core that can be easily developed in the future and meets the strict requirements of a strict and robust rights system. The creation of techdebt and the commitment to one provider should be avoided.
Why open source?
To summarize, the requirements for the new extranet boil down to an application that must be secure, performant, flexible and independent. Open source solutions have all these characteristics (and more).
Security
The core of the application is TYPO3. As an open source CMS with a large community, it has established itself over the last few decades and provides an extremely good and robust authorization system. It also serves as a data provider. A very active community monitors the security of the CMS and reacts quickly to current threats.
Performance
By using TYPO3 as the core and a self-developed React frontend, we were able to optimize response times. For the search, we rely on Solr with its own indices, which has led to noticeable improvements for users when searching for information on the extranet and thus promotes acceptance of the new application.
Flexible
During the conception phase, workshops were held with the various departments (suppliers, purchasing, marketing, IT, etc.). This made it possible to respond individually to the requirements of the individual departments and to develop the corresponding functions precisely. Together with good documentation and open code, it is easy to further develop the application and continue to operate it in the future.
Independence
The topics of "data sovereignty" and "vendor lock-in" are more topical than ever. In this project, too, it was important for FEGIME to be in control of its own data. As sensitive and also economically critical information for the shareholders is exchanged on the extranet, both security and sovereignty must be guaranteed. But what does that mean?
This requirement relates to both the hosting of the application and the code. A major advantage of open source solutions is that the code does not belong to the agency, but to the customer (in this case FEGIME). The developed code is open and can be viewed and managed by the customer's IT department. Should the framework conditions for the application or the collaboration with the agency change in the future, the code and all data belong to the client. This is a significant difference to providers of proprietary software.
Open source for SMEs
Our FEGIME project is a very good example of how open source helps SMEs to modernize without being at the mercy of a provider. No compromises have to be made in terms of security, features or application performance. Scaling the application is also possible without any problems.
With an open source solution, medium-sized and large companies can remain in control of their own data and have an application developed that is precisely tailored to their needs. And the whole thing is also free of license costs.
Case Study
FEGIME Germany GmbH & Co. KG
This project involves replacing an extranet that is over 15 years old. The monolithic architecture is being replaced and "Techdebt" abolished. You can find out how we proceeded at FEGIME Deutschland GmbH & Co. KG and why workshops and close coordination with the customer's project team are very important for the success of the project.
