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May 30, 2022

thyssenkrupp Automotive: Dynamics 365 as cloud-based CRM solution for best-in-class automotive supplier processes

A spring is just a spring. A vehicle steering system, however, is a complex control system comprising many individual components, and it requires extremely complex planning and development. For a company that sells everything from suspension components to steering systems, it is almost impossible to map the entire range with a single CRM solution. That’s why thyssenkrupp Automotive Technology relies on Microsoft Dynamics 365 and the CRM industry solution ORBIS AutomotiveOne. The CRM team uses templates to ensure that the software can be quickly adapted to the specific requirements of the different business areas. Microsoft Azure serves as a reliable, globally available basis for operations.

thyssenkrupp AG

The challenge: Standardized CRM for a whole host of different requirements

“Some of our business units are 100 years old, while others function like a start-up,” says Michael Eisenbeis, Head of Digital Sales & CRM at thyssenkrupp Automotive Technology. This sentence alone gives an idea of the challenges inherent in establishing a standardized customer relationship management (CRM) system at this globally active automotive supplier. “Our sales processes are very complex and sometimes run for years,” Eisenbeis explains, “with individual quotes that can be valued in the billions.” Given the high level of individuality and process complexity, for a long time the business units at thyssenkrupp Automotive Technology didn’t use a standard CRM solution. This meant that each quote would trigger a wide-ranging process of information gathering on file servers, along with emails, phone calls, and sometimes personal clarifications. To minimize the financial effort and the time this took, the company wanted to restructure its sales department and make it perform better as part of a sales excellence initiative. “We were late to the party with CRM,” Eisenbeis says, “so it’s been a real race to catch up and not just meet the industry standard, but exceed it."

The solution: ORBIS AutomotiveOne based on Microsoft Dynamics 365 and Microsoft SharePoint on Azure

This digital lighthouse project was launched in 2016 and the first rollout took place in summer 2019. The project team consisted of only two people: Eisenbeis and his colleague Marc Walkowiak. They deliberately allowed themselves plenty of time to model the complex processes without compromising on the user interface’s simplicity. As a result, the software can later be quickly adapted to suit business units with a wide range of requirements. The crm@Automotive solution was also to be part of the future modern workplace based on Microsoft 365. With this in mind, Eisenbeis and Walkowiak looked at CRM requirements from a sales perspective, designed processes from the ground up, and benchmarked them with an eye to best practices.

“It was a gigantic effort in the beginning to bring all the facts together, write a user story, then a change story, a digital manual, and so on,” Eisenbeis recalls. “But we made sure to get all stakeholders and affected parties deeply involved right from the start.” It was also important for him to get an experienced project partner on board that understood the specifics of the automotive industry and its requirements inside out. “That’s why we looked for a development partner that already had comprehensive experience with CRM in the automotive sector. And that’s exactly what we found with ORBIS,” Eisenbeis says. “For a project like this, working with a consultancy like ORBIS is an invaluable benefit.”

And so the CRM industry solution ORBIS AutomotiveOne, which is based on Dynamics 365, was selected. It covered as standard most of the functions thyssenkrupp Automotive Technology needed. To accelerate the rollout of the solution across all the various business units, the CRM project team opted for an unusual path—a kind of “digital multi-model manufacturing”: First, the project team rounded out ORBIS AutomotiveOne’s functionality so that the software could meet 100 percent of the requirements of a thyssenkrupp Automotive Technology business unit. That paved the way for a first rollout. In a second step, the project team derived tk’s own CRM core from this, which covers around 90 percent of the company-specific automotive sales process. If a business unit orders a CRM system, the CRM core provides a template for creating a customized CRM solution as quickly as possible. For example, the project team was able to set up customized CRM systems for the demanding Steering and Springs & Stabilizers business units within just a few months. Another exciting area here is the commercial aspect: common requirements are financed through what is effectively a crowdfunding approach, while the specific requirements are financed individually. To put it mildly, the cost effects are remarkable. In fact, the concept has proved so successful that the CRM team has transformed itself from a cost to a profit center. 

That was no easy task: “Requests from automotive manufacturers typically feature a great deal of complexity that needs to be represented,” Eisenbeis explains. Sometimes planning must assume large quantities, sometimes small ones; plans might be for China or the EU, or for left- or right-hand drive vehicles, etc. A request for quote in the Steering segment triggers a lengthy development process, since steering today is a complicated system of hardware and software with project-specific development. crm@AutoCore is there to support any complex aspect, whether quantity structures, regions, or products. “A quote that used to take two days can now be done in half a day—that’s a 75 percent reduction,” Eisenbeis says. At the same time, versioning means the status of each document can be precisely tracked. Supervisors can use an app to approve quotes, and the CRM system provides them with an overview of which steps are pending or even overdue. “All this,” he says, “shows that we’ve managed to make our sales processes more rigorous.”

One central point was to make operating the CRM as intuitive as possible: “We wanted a ‘social media experience for sales,’ so to speak—we wanted it to have a feel that you could really work well with,” Eisenbeis says. “That’s why we even slowed down the project a bit at one point, when a new user interface from Dynamics came on the market, so we could start working with it right away. In the end, it meant we were able to get the users excited about this solution—and they think the system is great.”

The foundation: An integrated solution based on Azure

“Microsoft Dynamics 365 is tightly integrated with our Microsoft 365, allowing for a high level of dovetailing with digital workplaces,” Eisenbeis says regarding the decision to adopt an Azure-based CRM solution architecture. “Once users log in at their workplace via single sign-on, they can access all the data. Microsoft technology guarantees that the data processes are secure, which makes it a lot easier to get Trusted Information Security Assessment Exchange (TISAX) certification.”

Initially, thyssenkrupp Automotive Technology had planned to run the SharePoint server for the CRM solution locally, but the company has now turned to Azure for this as well. “The topics of data protection and security are very high up on the agenda at thyssenkrupp,” Eisenbeis says. “It was very important for us that ORBIS go through ISO 27001 certification.” This provided the basis of trust in ORBIS’s cloud solution. Also for the customers. Speaking about how the project ran, Eisenbeis says that “ORBIS always delivered what was promised. That’s why this project involved relatively little effort, even though the project team was small.” Having the right development partner, the support of Microsoft Customer Success Management, and the right platform, he says, makes light work of implementing a project like this.

“Our business units want a modern, digitalized CRM solution on Azure, because this approach creates a single solution space supporting our sales processes for all use cases," Eisenbeis says in summary. “With Microsoft Dynamics, ORBIS AutomotiveOne, and SharePoint, each business unit has an individual 360° view of its customer relationships.” At the same time, the template approach significantly reduces the support effort, leaving more budget for further developments.

Currently, 140 employees are working with the CRM solution across three business units with order volumes of several billion euros, and there are a further 500 SharePoint users. A fourth business unit with 150 additional users is set to join them by the end of the business year. And the project that is currently running has an estimated duration of only eight months—so the planned acceleration of projects is already bearing fruit. In any case, Eisenbeis certainly can’t complain about a lack of demand from the business units: “We’re fully booked with projects for the next two years.”



“Our business units want a modern, digitalized CRM solution on Azure, because this approach creates a single solution space supporting our sales processes for all use cases. With Microsoft Dynamics, ORBIS AutomotiveOne, and SharePoint, each business unit has an individual 360° view of its customer relationships.”

Michael Eisenbeis, Head of Digital Sales & CRM, thyssenkrupp Automotive Technology

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