Cloud EDI IntegrationFull Steam Ahead for Business Integration: Sensor Expert Leuze Relies on Retarus Services

In Search of a More Efficient EDI Provider

Leuze electronic Deutschland GmbH + Co. KG is an international sensor expert in automation technology. The product portfolio of these “Sensor People” — as they call themselves — includes switching and measuring sensors, identification systems, as well as solutions for data transmission and image processing. In addition, Leuze offers components, services, and solutions for occupational safety. The company’s focus industries are intralogistics and packaging, machine tools, automotive, and laboratory automation. Leuze currently employs around 1,500 people worldwide and sells its products through 21 of its own sales organizations and more than 40 international distributors.

In its search for a new EDI provider, Leuze opted for Retarus. Leuze chose Retarus because of its industry experience, the flexibility and speed of the solution, the convincing price-performance ratio, and the harmonious overall concept. Another aspect was that Retarus has other solutions in addition to EDI that are of interest to Leuze.

100 Customers, 500 Process Connections via EDI

Retarus and Leuze have set their sights high. The goal is to connect 100 customers via EDI and map 500 process connections/five company processes by the end of the year. To start, around 50 prioritized EDI connections have already been implemented. A stated objective is to offer customers another digital sales channel in addition to the Leuze Online Shop.

Retarus has been offering EDI solutions for over 25 years, providing and operating the necessary infrastructure with software developed in-house, in its state-of-the-art data center in Munich. As an EDI service provider, Retarus manages the entire technical coordination on behalf of its customers with their business partners. The service specialists responsible for the solution are located in Munich, Erfurt, Milan, and Timisoara. Highly specialized EDI Implementation Engineers create on-schedule data mappings, regardless of industry, business process, format, or protocol.

A Go-Live Completely Within Budget and on Time

After a six-month selection process, Leuze launched its EDI implementation project in October 2022. The go-live took place in Q1 2023, with Retarus 100% within budget and on time. By the end of 2023, all major car manufacturers had been connected and 400 EDI connections were integrated into the system. More specifically, with more than 50 customers and 130 committed customer numbers, over 10 million euros in sales were now successfully processed using EDI.

Thanks to the targeted streamlining of order processing, 5,000 orders with an average of 13,000 items are now processed in just ten minutes. The software solution for order changes makes many repetitive “standard tasks” in the ERP system a thing of the past. Also, Leuze employees are now informed of all rescheduling via email well in advance and on a daily basis. To put this into perspective: before introducing EDI, this could take up to ten days.

In addition, employees have gained valuable knowledge during the implementation process as a clear action/reaction chain for the ordering process was defined. Furthermore, EDI messages are now also saved as human-readable PDF files to make them easier to retrieve. With the support of Retarus’ experts, Leuze is able to easily implement new EDI requirements within just a few days.

E-Invoicing

Leuze currently operates in 22 countries worldwide. In many of them, electronic invoicing is already mandatory or will soon be. Based on the positive experiences during the EDI implementation project, Leuze also opted for Retarus’ E-Invoicing solution in October 2023.

There was a careful selection process in which several solution providers were considered. Various strategic scenarios were analyzed, including an in-house solution, different service providers for each country, or one global provider. Leuze defined clear criteria for selecting the solution provider: global coverage and cost transparency, fast implementation and reliability, integration via EDI, data security and service availability, along with a well-planned rollout.

Leuze ultimately chose Retarus E-Invoicing — a fully managed service that uses standard ERP interfaces for invoice exchange. This meant that Leuze did not have to make any additional adjustments to their workflows. As a solution partner, Retarus handles country-specific invoice mappings and provides ongoing consultation for local requirements. Thanks to this strategic approach, Leuze not only meets the legal requirements of the various countries, such as South Korea, Italy, and Poland, but can also implement more efficient and standardized processes.

Optimizing the Business-Critical Supply Chain

With Retarus Cloud EDI Integration, Leuze benefits from efficiently connecting its business partners in a way that offers secure transactions, thereby optimizing its business-critical supply chain. Retarus’ EDI experts provide support in the form of consulting and personal assistance and ensure on-time implementation within the EU jurisdiction. Development, QA, operation, and support are all run in-house, meaning that the EDI service provider is also able to provide ad hoc services as needed, even outside of release cycles.

Retarus’ EDI services cover all relevant international requirements. Innovations and changes are implemented continuously and special formats are supported as required. Operating from auditable data centers offers maximum transparency in terms of security and process reliability. In addition to EDI conversion, Retarus offers additional services such as a signing service, archiving service, validation service, file transfer service, intelligent document processing, and reporting.

A Blossoming Partnership

Once the migration of all existing EDI connections to Retarus has been completed, the solution will also be rolled out at other national subsidiaries and in the purchasing department over the next few years. In addition, Leuze is planning to introduce Retarus Intelligent Document Processing in six countries in the short term in order to speed up its incoming orders process and minimize input errors.