Fabory accelerates digitalization with SAP and delaware

Fabory was established in 1947 by J.M. Borstlap. They soon began to sell most of their products under the brand name Fabory, focused on fasteners with deep technical expertise. In 2011 Fabory was acquired by a US conglomerate, who reverted the focus back to a broader set of Maintenance, Repair and Operations (MRO) products. Upon acquisition by Torqx in 2020, the focus was brought back to the specialist in fasteners it used to be. "The focus is fully on fasteners again," Muralidhar explains. "We want to be the absolute market leader in Europe in this field."

Fabory migrated its webshop to SAP Commerce Cloud with the help of partner delaware. The adoption of the cloud will further drive company’s growth and accelerate its digitalization.

Digital company

According to Muralidhar, an important enabler to become the market leader is the transition from a traditional company to a digital one. For instance, Fabory needs to be active in the online channels. "Many of our customers want to make the procurement of fasteners more efficient and are looking for online possibilities. This means that we should offer clients a digital channel when preferred, and approach such customers through digital marketing channels." 

The Chief Digital Officer also sees the contact with large customers digitalizing. "These companies depend on Fabory for their daily operations. It is an added value if we can give them a more detailed insight into the supply of materials and better predict their needs in three to six months, for example. This requires the integration of terabytes of data."

More focus on cloud

Muralidhar emphasizes that Fabory has already been a frontrunner on digital for years, long before the takeover by Torqx. For example, with the help of CX Assortment Management from SAP partner delaware, a new webshop was set up in which users could navigate more easily than before. "The takeover, however, has ensured that digitalization has moved into an even higher pace," says Wim Van Eyken, partner at delaware Netherlands. "There has been more emphasis on cloud, web and digital." 

The webshop was migrated from an on-premises platform to SAP Commerce Cloud. Muralidhar: "I used to receive almost weekly emails about the functioning of the webshop, or questions about the performance. That is something from the past. In the cloud, the right people at SAP and delaware make sure it works. We no longer notice that there is a system behind our webshop. It all works "as a service". This allows us to focus entirely on growing our business."

Ready yesterday

It did not stop with the migration to SAP Commerce Cloud. As part of the unbundling from the old owner, the HR system SAP SuccessFactors was also migrated to an environment fully managed by Fabory. The database behind the SAP ERP system was also redesigned. "And it all had to be done yesterday so that we could get back to focusing on growing our business as quickly as possible," says Muralidhar. "With delaware, we have a partner who understands all the different components and technologies."  

Ultimately, the Fabory and delaware team managed to complete the disentanglement and the migration to SAP Commerce Cloud within six months. "I am impressed that we met the tight deadline," observes Muralidhar. "The migration to SAP Commerce Cloud meant the migration of large amounts of data and a change of processes. It was much more than a lift and shift. Upon go-live we received dedicated support from both SAP and delaware to promptly resolve any issues that arose to make sure the operations could continue to run." 

According to Van Eyken, this success is partly due to good management. "From an early stage, there was a clear project plan that left no room for interpretation. There was a strong IT team at Fabory to support the integration, and the goals and deadlines were clear to everyone. This enabled us to make decisions quickly, and we were able to achieve a lot in a short space of time."