Customer Story

How Alexander Bürkle leverages reduced maintenance time by over 50%

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Patrick Held Data & Analytics Team Leader, Alexander Bürkle

I already built API endpoints for some use cases where I would have not been able to with [our previous integration tool.]

Patrick Held Data & Analytics Team Leader, Alexander Bürkle

Challenges

  • Challenging integrations
  • Time-consuming troubleshooting
  • Lack of visibility

Patrick Held, Data & Analytics Team Leader, had adopted an established ETL technology as part of his data modernization project. The goal was to build integrations that would allow for real-time analytics—no more manual uploads between systems; ideally, data would sync automatically.

First on the list was integrating the company’s ERP with its CRM (Salesforce). While the ETL tool was sufficient in building the integration and loading data into the company’s data warehouse, Patrick soon wanted to take on more and more integrations—and that’s where he ran into problems.

It became apparent that their ETL tool was cumbersome and too technical. Even with the necessary coding skills, Patrick and his team were still spending too much time on integrations. It took weeks to build an integration, and an average 4 to 8 hours each week thereafter to troubleshoot problems.

Patrick worried that the time involved and the technical barrier of using the tool would limit the company from scaling quickly. What’s more, there was a general lack of visibility in both understanding where errors were coming from and each endpoint for data. He knew he needed a different approach.

Solutions

  • Survey the integration space
  • Zero in on usability
  • Encourage a mindset change

Patrick was familiar with the major integration players, and quickly conducted a close analysis of 4 technologies, including Workato. Given the challenges of the existing ETL tool, Patrick eliminated those that he found too technical; in contrast, Workato’s usability was even more impressive.

That usability translated into huge time savings. During a Workato POC, Patrick was able to build an initial API in 15 minutes. Even after accounting for testing and enhancements, which brings that number closer to 3 hours, it was still a far cry from the multiple weeks that their ETL tool required.

Because of the many upsides to adopting Workato, it didn’t take long for Patrick to pull the trigger. However, Patrick’s team’s familiarity with the ETL tool meant that the transition wasn’t entirely seamless. Patrick describes his team needing a “mindset change” in order to fully see its benefits.

Results

  • Time cut from weeks → hours
  • No 8 hr weekly troubleshooting
  • Increased usability & flexibility

Within the first 2.5 months with Workato, Patrick and his team had already built 70 integrations, scaling their initiative to what had seemed unimaginable under the previous ETL tool. Patrick attributes much of this success to the time savings in building an integration in hours, not weeks.

What’s more, Patrick’s colleague no longer has to spend up to 8 hours each week troubleshooting integrations. With Workato, it’s easy to see each and every endpoint for data and quickly identify and rectify the root cause of any errors. The result is higher-quality, more trustworthy integrations.

Patrick has even built API endpoints with Workato that would’ve been logistically impossible to execute unde the previous ETL tool. They would’ve required a huge investment in building up a gateway, configuration, and security checks—all of which is included under the hood of the Workato platform.

Finally, the results of the Workato platform have already begun rippling out beyond Patrick’s team to the rest of the company. With an increased amount of higher-quality integrations, the company has increased confidence in their data, most of all because they can trust it to be up to date.

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